Once upon a Mermaid
by OtomePrincess
Summary: AU Shizuo is a soldier that gets deployed to one of the richest cities in the kingdom. While there, he starts hearing weird legends about dangerous creatures that roam the sea. Being who he is, of course he will not let himself be easily wallowed by the town superstitions. But what will happen when suddenly faced by this not-so-imaginary siren? And what is he searching? Shizaya
1. Chapter 1

**Once upon a mermaid**

**Summary****: **AU Shizuo is a soldier that gets deployed to one of the richest cities in the kingdom. While there, he starts hearing weird legends about dangerous creatures that roam the sea. Being who he is, of course he will not let himself be easily wallowed by the town superstitions. But what will happen when suddenly faced by this not-so-imaginary siren? Who is he and what is he searching for? Shizaya. Drama and Romance. T for sexual references and swearing.

**Author's Note**: Hey there minna! This is my first attempt at a DRRR! Story. I must warn you! The characters may be OoC. This plot bunny was born from one of my dreams and I couldn't stop thinking about it until I got it out of my head. Hopefully, it will not have too many chapters. Also, rating may go up if I deem it necessary, but must likely will remain T

**Disclaimer**: I don't own DRRR! nor any of its characters. This was created just for entertainment. Now, on to the story!

**Chapter 1**

**Shizuo's POV**

"Sir… Sir! Wake up, sir!" A rough and annoyed voice stirred me up from my sleep.

A groan passed through my lips as my body slowly started to come back from the slumber realm. I became aware that the constant rocking of the car that lulled me to sleep in the first place had stopped. Stretching my limbs as far as I could in the reduced space, I opened my eyes to the man in front of me. A look of impatience was what received my still dazed gaze.

"Honestly; after a trip in such an irregular path, how could anyone sleep that deep?" The man mumbled within his exaggerated mustache, turning away from the door of the car and climbing on the back to get my luggage.

I frowned.

"Get yourself 15 years of sleeping in rock hard militia beds and tell me" I mumbled back, climbing down of the car and finally stretching properly. My back gave a pleasurable _crack_ before I finally faced the town before me.

I must say that all the information about Sagena City that my friends and teachers tried so hard to prepare me with, paled when compared to the actual thing.

"_Big, my ass! This city is fucking HUMONGOUS!"_ I couldn't stop my jaw from dropping at the sight before me. Wherever my eyes darted, there where handfuls of people bustling around the crammed streets. Sellers, buyers, ordinary people just trying to move around the masses, soldiers doing their rounds; the place looked like a total mess!

While my mind was still trying to wrap around the idea that all these people lived like this every day, so this must have been a NORMAL market morning, my feet almost get run over by another ambulant seller that was trying to move his whole merchandise to an apparent better spot. I barely got the chance to move a few steps away just in time.

Before my temper even flared up at the stupidity of the seller, I heard a slight chuckle beside me. "First time in Sagena, kid?" I turned around to the same car driver that hauled me and my things to this God Forsaken city. I couldn't see it very well, but the man must've had a satisfied smile below that curtain of a 'stache.

I frowned again, forgetting my initial shock and feeling how my ignored temper started to rise once more. "Cocky bastard" I murmured a curse under my breath. I picked up my luggage from the floor and stood up to see the tiny and chubby man already on top of the driver seat, commanding the horses to get back on the move. The man turned back one last time.

"With any luck, you will not be eaten by a siren before you get a map!" He laughed at his own joke, striking the lash at the beasts one more time and disappearing from my sight within the sea of people.

I stood there rooted for a minute, wondering what the obviously sadistic little man could have meant by that. I released an exasperated sigh before turning on my heels again to face the metropolis and starting the stride to the military base.

"Fuck, I need a smoke".

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

By the time I arrived at the base, it was already past midday. After being protocolary scolded for my tardiness, I was guided to the room that was to be mine. I was gladly surprised when I found out that the guy that shared the room with me was one of my senior classmates. His name was Tom. He was a great pal; great company because he liked to talk on and on without waiting for an extensive response on my part, and a great friend because he could read my mood with just one glance and no further questions would be asked about the topic. We had established a good camaraderie during the military training.

I also made others not so worthy-of-mention friends within the base. There was this guy, Kadota, whose priority wasn't peering into the personal lives of others. I quickly sympathized with him. Then there was the base's doctor, an obsessed and perverted guy by the name of Shinra. I would have already strangled the guy just to shut him up if only he weren't the only medical specialist at hand. Finally, there was the base's nurse. She was a fragile-looking woman that couldn't speak because of some unknown reason. Heed me when I said fragile-LOOKING, because there was nothing fragile about Celty. I remember that one time during one of the morning announcements; one of the newbies was gloating about a date that apparently went too well with his comrades and the praises he received went to his head pretty quickly. When Celty appeared before the announcements started, the fool made the mistake to offer Celty the "night of her life if she was willing". With so much of a little smile on her face, she approached the guy and I swear I have never seen a fully clad soldier flying such a long distance through the air. Not at least when it wasn't caused by me.

All in all, the first bad impression that I got from the city on my first day here started to fade away with my life as a soldier. But there was something that was still bothering me about that first day, and I only remembered about it until weeks later.

I was having lunch with Tom at the Dining Hall; there weren't many others beside us and the cooks. We were enjoying a quiet meal when a word from a nearby conversation caught my attention.

"-Siren's curse! There is no other explanation!" It came from the high pitched murmur of one of the women in the kitchen.

My eyes widened with recognition when I heard the word again. "_Siren? That's what that guy said that time too…"_ I strained my ears to try and keep hearing the rest of the conversation.

"Hush!" The other woman exclaimed in another loud murmur. "If you keep repeating it, a siren will really come and snatch your son!"

The first woman tried to gulp back a sob. "What am I supposed to do? A siren must have already cursed him!" The voice was starting to crack at the edges, becoming louder with despair. "His fever is not going down, I've already tried everything! It has to be a siren's curse!" She spat the last words with venom in her voice.

"I'm telling you to stop saying that! If it's really a siren's curse, you're only making the siren's hold on your son even stronger by repeating it!" I couldn't keep hearing the conversation because a hand was suddenly waved in front of me. I snapped back to face Tom.

"What?" I asked a little bit annoyed that my eavesdropping was suddenly interrupted.

"You weren't eating your food anymore, and you had a face like you suddenly chewed on eggshells, you okay?" Tom asked, genuine concern latched on his tone.

I immediately calmed down. "Yeah, it's nothing" I responded, disregarding the topic and finishing my food.

Tom watched me for a few seconds before dropping the issue and resuming his meal. We returned to the calm silence before an idea occurred to me.

"What is a siren?" I asked seemingly out of the blue.

Tom snapped his eyes open and the food that was on its way to his mouth fell from the fork and onto the table.

"What?" my senior mimicked my reaction from a few minutes ago.

"Siren" I repeated without changing my expression "What is that?"

Tom looked at me for a second, suddenly looking like I was trying to pull a prank on him. But his expression went back to incredulous when he noticed that I wasn't joking. "Are you telling me that you came all the way here to Sagena without knowing anything about the sirens?" His tone had gone up a few decibels, reflecting the emotion on his face.

I blushed a little at the comment, noticing that the food spilled on the table was more interesting that the utter disbelief in my partner's face. "Well… It's not like I decided to be sent here by my own free will… Besides, I've always hated history" I murmured, trying to defend myself.

A minute passed in tense silence.

I dared a sideways glance back at Tom, only to find him trying to contain his laughter.

A vein popped out.

I closed my eyes, frustrated and embarrassed about the whole situation. I stood up and grabbed my dishes, making a turn to leave.

"Ah! No, Shizuo! Wait!" Tom said rushed, not being able to contain the amusement on his tone. He grabbed me by the end of my shirt while I was leaving. "Forgive me! I was just… Shocked! That's all! I wasn't laughing at you!" I turned around to assess his expression. Even with the smile still plastered in his face, I could tell that he didn't mean to piss me off. I sighed and caressed my temple before answering.

"Okay, care to explain me now?"

"Uh sure, but I think it would be better if we got out of here" Tom answered, giving the room a glance before setting his eyes back on me.

I did so myself too and could see that the women that were speaking before were now glancing our way with distrustful eyes. I turned back to Tom and nodded my response, quickly grabbing our dishes and setting them on the sink in our way out.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

Tom guided me through the town all the way up to the beach surrounding a good two-thirds of the city border. No wonder the city owed its prosperity to the sea.

"So," Tom started, clearing his throat after an especially salty breeze passed between us. "What do you know about sirens?"

"Ok, first of all. Are we speaking about the same sirens than in the fairy tales?" I couldn't stop the sarcastic intonation of the word. "Like, mermaids living in the sea, underwater, making boats sink if you approach them or whatever?"

Tom chuckled with my tone. "Yes, I think we can say we are referring to the same creatures. However…" The tone of his voice suddenly became grim. "I don't think they are as harmless as they seem in your fairy tales"

I remained silent, waiting for him to elaborate on the topic I was so curious about. The beach was long and the sea was at peace, the only sound accompanying our stroll was the sound of the waves and the sand underneath our feet.

"Ok, so…?" I spoke, my anxiety getting the better of me. "What's the difference?"

"Yeah, the main difference with the ones you know and the ones from Sagena should be that these ones kill for fun" The word sent a strange shiver down my spine.

"For fun?" I repeated in disbelief.

"As you heard" he continued. "I've never seen one since I was assigned to this city, whatsoever" Tom shrugged. "But all the citizens seem to have this strange obsession that everything that goes wrong with their lives is the sirens' fault"

"But that's plain stupid!" I exclaimed out loud.

I could have sworn I heard a tiny laugh somewhere behind me. I turned around immediately, but all that greeted me was our footprints in the sand.

"Yeah, you may be right" Tom continued, not noticing my slight distraction from our conversation. "But they are the ones who have lived here for decades. It's not like you can go and tell them that what they believe in is stupid. They must have their reasons to believe in such an improbable thing as the siren's curse"

"Sirens don't even exist in the first place!" I retorted, back into the topic. "How can they believe in such nonsense?"

"I don't know Shizuo, I'm just telling you what has been told to me since I decided to come here" Tom said suddenly sheepish.

"I know. Sorry Tom, I didn't mean to blame it on you. It's just that…" I scratched the back of my head. "Ever since I came here I've been hearing this shit about sirens and curses so..." I apologized.

"No harm done!" Tom said with a smile. "You can believe whatever you feel like, anyways"

"Do you believe it, too?" I asked with curiosity in my voice.

"Well! As I was telling you, these people have been living here for far longer than I have, they must have their reasons. As for me…" He suddenly turned around and gazed directly into my eyes. "It's not like I blame all the bad things in my life to them, but you will never see me taking a swim in this beach!"

I laughed at the serious tone that Tom was using.

"That's fair, I think" I responded with a smile of my own.

"No, seriously!" Tom whined, feigning terror. "One of the very first stories they told me when I got here was that these sirens look like the most beautiful creature in the world when they are at the sea, but they are actually quite ugly to behold!" And he kept feigning trembles all over his body and kept telling me more of these sirens' weird powers.

Just before leaving the beach, I turned around one last time and faced nothingness once more.

"What's up?" Chirped Tom in a better mood than before.

"What-. No, it's nothing" I responded quickly, going back to town "_I know I heard someone whisper 'Interesting…'"_

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

_OtPr: Awww! This is the first chapter! How was it? You liked it? Hated it? Whatever feel free to leave your comment! And~ If you feel that I have to improve anything, or see an error in my grammar, please be a dear and let me know! Next chappy should be up next week! Reviews make me very happy! Until next time!_


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's note:** Hi everyone! Sorry for the delay! (It was just a day though…) Here's the second chapter of "Once upon a mermaid"! Hell yeah! Sorry, but I didn't thought I would make it on time. You'll see why at the end of the chapter. Now! For those who reviewed!

Akakuro Seiya: Thanks for the love! Here´s the second chapter, as promised!

MaliceHawk: Dun dun dun! Guess who appears in this chapter? Hahaha, hopefully it will fulfill your expectations. Hahaha, and I really think that if you were to really send Shizuo after me, I would stop writing the story just to fawn all over him. I LOVE HIM. But do not fear! No Shizuo becoming real on my near future, so the story is safe. For now?

Clear-skyz: Thanks! Hope I can keep it that way.

Guest: Whoever are you, do not fear. The second chapter is here!

NGMS: No sé si llegaras a leer esto, pero me alegra que alguien se esforzara tanto para leer el primer capítulo. Muchas gracias! Jajaja, ojala aun siga siendo interesante para que lo leas. Y no estas sol . Yo tambien hago lo que sea para leer Shizaya. Es tan BUENO!

And finally, thank you all who followed/favorited my story. You make me very happy and inspired me to continue it!

Ok, that's it for the thankfulness. On with the second chapter!

**Chapter 2**

**Shizuo's POV**

It was after the morning training of my second month in Sagena when I finally received official orders from the Captain.

"Sorry for the delay Heiwajima" The man apologized while handing me the schedule that I had to follow during my rounds along with a detailed map of the routes I had to cover. "I feel bad now. On your first day here you were scolded for being late and look at how much time it took for us to finally put your schedule in line" The words spoken would have made you think that the man was at least apologetic, but his tone and face remained almost expressionless. The business-like atmosphere was ever present.

"Ah, I don't mind" I answered lightly, reading the surface of the documents and pretending my attention was directed to the words on the paper.

Truth be told, I've never met a man that puts me on edge as easily as the man before me. Captain Shiki was by no means a tall, bulky person. By this, I'm not saying that the man wasn't intimidating. There was something in the way the Captain conducted his work, always so unpassionate, almost bored. Yet, the aura surrounding the guy made you think it twice before defying his words. The force behind it all must have been in his eyes, that piercing and unwavering gaze that never left your eyes no matter what happened whenever he spoke with you. I'm not the kind of person to observe others and classify them; to me, it always came down to two options: There were those who pissed me off and those who didn't. But I couldn't fit him in either of those.

I mumbled a "Thanks" and waited for the guy to discharge me. He just acknowledged my words with a barely noticeable nod before shooing me away with his hands. I left the office successfully keeping my unfazed mask on. Once that I made sure that the door was safely closed behind me, I slowly released the breath I was holding through my nose.

I walked briskly back to my room so I could really check my schedule once I was there.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

"Yo, Shizuo" Tom's voice welcomed me once I opened the door.

I grumbled in response. Walking to my side of the room and sitting on the chair of my desk, finally checking my route and schedule. I noticed that I was assigned to check on the border of the city that was mostly covered by the beach and the port. The time was from 7 AM through 3 PM and it was one of the longest routes, but surely it was because those spots were easy to survey. And I suspected that the news about my stamina and physical condition had something to do too. Whatever, I wasn't going to complain. I had actually thought that they would give me something much worse than this.

"Finally got your round schedule? Let me see" My companion rose from his spot on the bed and went behind me so he could take a look at the documents from over my shoulder. "Huh? Isn't this whole part the beach?" He said while pointing the whole route with his finger.

"Yeah, and part of the port too" I answered, finally reaching the end of the schedule assignment. I was going to settle it on top of my desk when Tom snatched the stack of paper from my fingers and started to scan it like a mad man. His expression was sour when he finished reading the file. "What?" I asked, knowing exactly what was wrong with the whole thing, but feigning ignorance.

"Shizuo," His voice was serious "I know you don't believe in this whole 'Man Eating Sirens' deal, but… This route here…" he trailed off, giving another concerned glance at the paper in his hands.

Here we go again. Ever since that fatidic day a week ago, he has been acting like this. It seems that Tom had started to really take the superstitions of the citizens into consideration. We would still agree in that not all the disgraces that happened to the people in Sagena were caused by the Siren's Curse, but that didn't mean that those deaths near the beach didn't happen either.

It all happened eight days ago. We received the report from some of the fishermen stating that they have found traces of blood on the beach. I was sent along with Tom and three other soldiers to assess the situation.

All I can say is that what we found was not pretty.

After a long walk following nothing but weird blots of blood, footsteps and whatever could have caused a sand trail as weird and irregular as that, we turned after a corner of the boulder only to find a grotesque scene before us.

There were two unmoving bodies in the sand near the wall. We recognized our uniforms immediately. We sent one of the other soldiers to go fetch the Captain while the rest rushed to the bodies to inspect them. After a quick inspection, we found out that strangely enough, the cause of death seemed to have been drowning. Sure, there where bloody gashes on their faces, chests and arms, but those weren't deep enough to have killed them. Their faces were colored a sickly shade of blue and their eyes were turned inwards, like there was nothing they could have done to defend themselves. And if that wasn't enough… The rigor mortis on the soldier's faces was a creepy and almost maniac smile. Of course, that day also marked the start of Tom's paranoia.

Back to the present and the current concern of Tom about my schedule, I could only find it in myself to try and dismiss his worry.

"Come on Tom, you can't seriously think that those two were killed by a-"

"Then what DID kill them, Shizuo?" Tom interrupted me, his tone telling me that he was already tired of me not believing in these things.

"I don't know. Some burglar that got off of hand or something like that…" I shrugged, really trying not to think too hard about it. Tom released an exasperated sigh.

"Even you can't keep denying that-"It was my turn to interrupt him.

"And do what exactly, Tom?" I asked, my tone was louder than I intended it to be. "It's not like I can go back to the Captain and request for my round to be changed because I 'might be attacked by a siren'".

Tom seemed to imagine the scenario in his head, shivering at the possible outcome. In the best case, I would be forced to follow an inhumanly possible training under the Captain himself, just with the excuse of: "If you're stronger than the others, then there should be nothing to fear". A twitch forced itself below my eye just thinking about the expression that the man would wear during my torture. It was well known that Captain Shiki smiled for just a handful of things; delivering punishments was one of them.

"I'm just saying that you should be more concerned about this and not just accept it like it is nothing to be worried about" Tom reprehended me, finally leaving the papers on my desk. "Whatever killed those guys could very well still be there…" The last part was mumbled and barely audible.

I heard it as well as a scream on my ear, though.

"Yeah, I know" I responded, acknowledging that Tom's worries weren't that unfounded. "I'll be careful" I tried to reassure him with a genuine smile. The worry didn´t completely disappear from Tom's eyes, but at least the anxiety surrounding him was dispersed.

"Promise you won't do anything reckless on your own?" he added, his voice had a forceful joking tone on it. His hands rested on his hips in a scolding manner.

"Sure, sure; I promise" I assured while closing my eyes and lifting both my arms in front of me. "But you must already know Tom that is not me who calls for trouble. It just naturally comes to me" I bitterly mumbled the last sentence.

Tom started to walk back to his bed, lifting both his arms in a defeated gesture. "And that's what worries me the most, Shizuo".

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

I was making my way to the most deserted part of the beach after finishing my round around the port and the sea market. It took me a good four hours to check on the whole place following the route assigned to me, and even then, it was not like my route covered the whole port. It was times like these that made me remember of my first impression of Sagena: fucking HUMOUNGUS.

After bumping into three-fourths of the Sagena morning market sellers and getting my feet rolled over by dozens of their ambulant stores, you could tell that I was not in the best of moods. I could only thank whoever god was out there that the rest of my round was in the less populated area of the whole city. Less people meant less chances of someone pissing me off.

I reached the part of the road where we found the corpses of those soldiers and faced the waves. I couldn't take the expression on their faces off my mind. What could possibly make you smile while you are drowning? An unintentional shiver ran down my spine at the thought. I shook my head and turned to resume my stroll…

And that's when I heard it.

It was barely there, but that was definitely a murmur. I snapped my head to face the stone wall, but nobody was near me. I took a few steps in that direction, raw curiosity nagging at the back of my mind. I could still hear someone murmuring something that I could not understand. When I was a few yards away from the wall was when I noticed a fissure in the rock that I could not see before. There was a large rock blocking the chasm away from sight when you faced the stone wall from the sea, but now that I was looking at it from the sides, I could see that the fissure was big enough to fit a person.

In other circumstances, I would have kept my promise to Tom about not doing anything rash, but my mind was set on finding the source of that voice, that up until now had done nothing but intensify.

I approached the fissure and noticed that my chest plate and boots would not let me continue. Very hesitantly, I removed them and left them on the sand beside the boulder along with my helmet and gloves, just keeping my trustworthy sword hanging securely from my belt. I took a breath to steady my anxiety before finally taking a step inside of the crack.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

I must say I couldn't have foretold that the end of the rift would lead to a small and humid cavern. The walls and the floor were slippery and hard to get a solid grasp onto, but I managed to reach the inside of the creak without slipping. My sight was having a hard time adjusting to the lack of illumination, but I could tell that what I had in front of me was some kind of pond. I strained my ears to see if I could still grasp the voice that led me here, and sure enough I heard it.

Only then did I notice that it was not a murmur per se, it was more like a jumble of gasps and weird words spat together in a low voice. Was this person hurt?

I held my breath in and started to force my eyes to inspect what was in front of me. Sure enough, there was a small body of water right in front, surrounded by rocks. I took a few steps away so I could surround the pond, trying not to fall in the process.

"Hello?" I finally dared to ask, still trying to see from where the voice was coming from.

All that answered me was a loud gasp and a splash of water. I hurried my steps to the sound, seriously thinking that whoever was there must have been scared of my voice and fell in the water.

When I neared the water surface though, there was nobody there.

I looked all over the cavern, but all that I could see where rocks and water.

"What the hell…?" I had to ask me. I was sure I heard a voice coming from somewhere in here, but now left alone in this cavern with nothing but the echo of my steps, made me question myself. Was there really a voice to begin with? The murmur had been really soft, like some kind of melody… "Maybe…" I turned away from the pond and from that nagging feeling that I got from it. My mind then decided it was a good time to think that maybe Tom's paranoia and the whole town superstitions could very well held some truth about them… Nah. "I´m thinking too much about it…" I murmured to myself, trying to reassure my beliefs.

Before I could even take my first step away though, reality decided to slap my beliefs right across the face. I felt how my body was slammed full force by something from behind me, the shock from the surprise attack made me lose my balance and fall right on my face. When the rough and humid floor made contact with my face, I knew I was pissed off at whatever was lying on my back.

"What the fuck!?" I groaned, trying to push the weight off my back, but my struggling all but stopped when a voice answered me back.

"What are you doing here, filth?" a question was barked in a male voice. I recognized the melodious tone immediately. Suddenly, I felt how something sharp was pushed upon my neck. "Came to finish what the others couldn't?"

At the words, the warning from Tom came back to my mind: _"Whatever killed those guys could very well still be there…"_ My mind went red. Was this bastard the same who killed those men? And now he was thinking about doing the same to me?

My fists and jaw clenched, my body tensed all over and in a swift push I got rid of the inhumanly heavy weight on my back. I could tell that the other was not expecting such a display of strength by the way his reaction was delayed. I took advantage of the surprise and made a quick grab of the guy's wrists, rapidly pinning them over his head and straddling his waist between my knees. The position was perfect for me to connect a square punch in the bastard's face, but the expression on the other's face made me stop. His eyes were widened with surprise, but even in the dark, I could see that the glare that followed was glowing red. I felt how my breath hitched at the sight. Those eyes were definitely NOT human. My eyes quickly scanned the rest of the body when my mind took notice of the slippery feeling of the skin beneath me. I can't say what shocked me more at that moment, if it was the nasty gash on the right side of his waist, or the fact that right at his waist the skin was covered in what I could only guess were _scales_. My eyes widened at the realization: a siren.

The creature must have noticed my hesitation and managed to slip an arm out of my hold. In a quick motion, it slashed his nails across my chest, making a clean cut on the skin. I hissed at the sudden pain and my hand quickly held down the free arm again, but I still couldn´t bring my fist down into his face.

In the struggle of his body against mine, my gaze caught the glimpse of pain crossing across the siren's "_Or is it merman…?" _features. I remembered seeing a gash on his side and inspected the wound again. Indeed, the gaping hole of flesh seemed painful. Then, out of nowhere, the struggle stopped completely. I refocused my eyes on his face, checking if maybe I killed him without noticing. "_Can sirens even breathe out of water?"_

"What are you waiting for? An invitation?" The same voice spat, his tone held a mocking tone that almost made me lose it and really smash his skull against the floor. "Kill me and let´s get this over with, monster" The taunt was said with such a venomous feel to it that made my stomach churn. I have never appreciated that kind of insult, even less coming from a REAL monster.

"Aren´t you the real monster here?" I asked, my anger slipping in my tone. The glowing eyes widened again before a chirping laughter filled the cave.

"What, am I a monster now for that puny scratch?" The mirth in the voice was starting to get on my nerves. What the hell was wrong with this guy?

"Don't pretend you don't know!" My fists closed even more on his wrists, earning a small whimper from that snarky mouth. "Wasn't it you who killed those soldiers?!"

At the mention, the joy completely left his body. His eyes narrowing until I could only see the slits. This only assured my assumption. This creature had indeed killed them.

"Bastard…" I snarled. "Answer me!"

"You didn't come here for answers, did you?" The tone was still playful, but now there was a dangerous undertone behind it. "If you came here for revenge, go ahead. There's nothing stopping you" That was true, I already knew that this bastard was the one who killed them, and siren or not, I was a soldier of Sagena. I had to deliver punishment to those who deserved it and keep the peace of the town, so why…?

With a war cry, I lifted my fist to take momentum and strike it down. However, when my knees once again rubbed against the gash on his side and the pain appeared on the other's face again, my resolution faltered and the punch only left a dent on the floor, beside the guy's head. When the creature reopened its eyes, there was plain confusion in them. There was something about that expression that made me forget all about the murders that happened, much less about the danger I could be placing myself in. I just knew I couldn't punch someone that was already injured and down, be it a human or not.

"Don´t think I'm the same as you, bastard." The words seemed to confuse him even more. I released his wrists and stood away from his body, finally being able to see the tail instead of legs at the guy's body. "_Okay, I owe Tom three dinners…"_

"What? Just like that?" The incredulous tone used caught me by surprise. I glanced back to the merman's face. His eyes glinted with something akin to amusement. Didn't he understand that I could have killed him just now?

"Huh…?"

"Oh, I see!" The guy clapped his hands in front of him. "You must be new in town… Or you're just a retarded!" I could clearly feel how a vein popped out on my forehead.

"Oi, you…!" Before I could even retort with my own insult, the guy laughed again. Damn voice of his.

"Anyways! You´re really interesting!" In a quick jump like movement, the creature jumped back to the pond, only to resurface in seconds. My mind still had a hard time believing that those things I heard about in town were true, and now I had one of those mythical creatures swimming right in front of me. "See you around, retarded~. Oh, and you should take care of that scratch there" He said while pointing the blood on my shirt. I took a quick glance into my chest and back into the pond, only to find that the siren wasn't there anymore.

I stood there a good five minutes before realizing that the guy wasn't coming back. I released an exasperated sigh while scratching my head, finally deciding that I had to finish my round and get out of here.

"_Damn citizens and their superstitions"_ I thought while walking out of the creak, the laughter from before still ringing in my ears. _"They should at least warn you that sirens can be some snarky bastards"._

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

_OtPr: And we are… DONE! Hahaha, I must tell you. This chapter was very hard for me to write, especially because I couldn't decide which reactions Izaya would have when finally facing Shizuo. Yeah, I admit it. I have a hard time putting Izaya into character. Hope it wasn't too bad, maybe? On the other hand! This was hard to write because I was hospitalized! Yey! Now seriously, writing fanfics must be a real author-related-accident magnet. I have several authors who at some point of their story are hospitalized or something… Hope this was the last one for me. Anyways! You know I love your reviews and follows. Thank you all for your support and the next chapter should be up next week!_


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's note:** I'm not dead! I'm so sorry for the long wait! I promise it will not happen again! As a show of appreciation to all those who will still read this, this chapter is extra-large. Hope you like it!

**Akakuro Seiya:** I´m sorry for the wait on the update, hope this chappy is of your liking again!

**Maru de Kusanagi:** Hahaha, yes. That's what happens when you bet on your senpai knowledge! Thanks! I hope you like the siren Izaya of this chapter as well!

**nameless feeling:** Thank you! I'm glad you think so.

**eccentricpanda801:** Hahaha, really? I personally find it easier to write like this. Yes, I'm doing all well now! (If only I could make my brain work faster… *sighs*). I promise I will write faster now!

**MaliceHawk:** Thanks for your wonderful review! Hahaha, yes, it's kind of funny. I really hope you think the same of the Izaya in this chapter QwQ. I'm so glad to hear that! Actually this FF started off with a dream I had about being a siren LOL. Would love to feed your imagination anytime!

Ok, I'll stop babbling now. On with the chapter!

**Chapter 3**

**Shizuo´s POV**

"What am I even doing here…?" The question sounded through my mind for the umpteenth time that day.

I was standing in front of the chasm that I have come to know oh so very well for the past few days. In my right hand was a rucksack that contained, among other things, some medicines and some ointments that Celty was so kind to provide me with, after seeing the cut in my chest five days ago.

"_Five days ago, huh…"_

That day… I think I will never forget the expression that the quiet nurse put on when I showed her my wound when I came back to the base. It seems that not only was the cut made with something really sharp, but also, it seems that it was poisoned. Go figure, these sirens were as deathly and dangerous as the townspeople feared.

Of course I couldn´t tell her nor Shinra the real cause of the cut. A half assed lie about a cave that I stumbled upon having a sharp edge on one of its walls was the only thing I could come up with at the moment. Neither of them seemed to believe me, of course; But Shinra dropped the subject after a short while and also agreed to not tell Tom anything about it, but I couldn´t shake off the feeling that Celty had become a little too wary of me ever since then…

Well, it could just be me. Is not like I´ve been my best these past few days anyways.

Between trying to prevent Tom from catching a look of my chest (Hard thing to do being roommates), writing my report of that day skipping any real detail about the dream-like creature that attacked me and avoiding to show any sign of the shiver that attempted to run down my body when the inquisitive glare of Captain Shiki was sent my way after being asked if there was anything mention-worthy about my recent patrols on town…

Definitely more nerve wracking than preparing for the militia admission exams.

I don´t even know why I haven´t spilled anything about that dangerous encounter to anyone. That bastard had even admitted that he was the one behind the murders of those soldiers, so why haven´t I…

Frustrated with myself, I ran a hand through my hair before finally taking the first step inside the cave.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

I stood once more in front of that pond inside the cave. The dark water welcomed me as I stared at its depths, just waiting for something, anything actually, to happen. I haven´t seen that guy (If I could call it that) again since he disappeared in those waters five days ago.

What was I expecting anyways? That monster to come out again and… And what, really? Was that monster even real or did I just imagine the whole thing…? I shook my head at the thought. No. It was real. The cut in my chest was proof of that.

I let out the air that I was holding and bashed my head mentally for doing this same routine for the fifth consecutive day. That thing was long gone to the ocean and planning to never return for all I know.

But just when I was turning around to exit the cave, I heard it. The sound of the water surface being broken by something.

I turned around so fast that I was surprised I didn´t give myself a whiplash. My eyes immediately fell back onto the pond and I couldn´t help the sharp intake of air when two glowing red eyes stared right back at me. My blood completely froze at the sight of pale white skin coming up from the otherwise pitch black waters. It was like an image taken straight out from one of the Sagenians nightmares.

I can´t tell for sure just how long our stare contest extended, but it ended when the mysterious creature started to move (Or swim, whatever) at an inhumanly high speed in my direction. My first instinct was to search for the sword hanging at my side, ready to use it if the situation demanded it, my eyes never leaving those of the siren. He stopped right at the edge of the pond and, after a short moment, decided to pull his head completely out of the water to speak.

"Why, if it isn´t the retarded" his voice said in an amused tone, his eyes narrowing slightly as his mouth twisted itself in a smirk.

I stopped myself from jumping in surprise, the sudden disruption of the silence taking me out of the hazy state I was in since the appearance of the creature. Before I could even retort, he continued.

"Coming here alone again? You must be either really confident or really stupid" He made a short pause and I could feel my blood start to boil. "I'm inclined to believe the latter" He giggled at his own joke and I felt my patience snap.

If you haven't noticed up until now, I don't own the biggest patience there is (Even though I wish I did, it could bring me a little more peace). So before even knowing what was going on anymore, my body moved by itself and took out the big rock that was resting beside me, raising it over my head while my eyes could only see red.

"WHO ARE YOU CALLING A RETARDED, HUH!?" I heard myself roar while throwing the rock right at the pond.

I big splash followed the action and I saw the rock sinking heavily on the body of water, making the excess of it overflow and soak my naked feet. I waited until the waters became calm once more and waited another minute before realizing what I have done.

"Damn…" I cursed under my breath, damning my temper and strength.

I had come here all these days expecting for something like this to happen, and when it does I have to scare the frigging bastard…

Before I could continue that train of thought, I saw something whitish moving inside the pond. I fixed my sight on it until the siren came out of the water once more, his glowing eyes wide with surprise and strangely, not a sign of fear could be found in his expression. It was more like… He found all that amusing.

"My apologies," he said with mirth, recovering his playful behavior. "Monster is more like it, right?" he laughed once more, his eyes watching my every move in the case I decided that the pond needed another rock.

It was extremely difficult not to follow through that thought.

"I already told you…" my voice was low, clear sign that my patience was at its limit AGAIN. "I don´t appreciate that name, much less from a REAL monster like you…"

The creature huffed, raising his chin and smiling at the comment.

"I beg to differ, I cannot lift rocks that weight ten times more than me. That clearly makes you the REAL monster between us" At that moment I really wished I could just shut up that smartass mouth.

"SHUT U-!"

"PLUS!" he interrupted me. "I have no real name to call you by now, do I?" He explained like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

I frowned at that, it pained me to admit that the bastard was right. I scoffed, diverting my gaze from those glowing rubies.

"The name´s Shizuo" I spat, finding no real reason to provide my last name.

From the corner of my eye I saw the creature test the word on his lips without pronouncing it. I propped a brow at that. He looked like a kid.

"So…?" I urged, turning his way again.

He looked me like he didn´t understood what I was referring to.

"Yours. What´s yours?" my voice was trembling with exasperation.

Realization washed over his face before he smirked once more.

"What, you think I'm so stupid as to provide my important name just because you asked?"

Not the best day for my patience, as you can see.

My body decided that the pond indeed needed another rock and one near me was the perfect size for the job. While raising it though, I was stopped by his voice.

"Stop!" I turned around to see the siren´s resigned face. "Okay, okay, I got it. Just… Leave the rocks already" he said, crossing his arms over his chest.

The rock returned to its place with a crashing sound. Some of the smaller rocks around it fell to the water along with some dirt.

"Geez, you should learn how to handle your temper, you-"

"Weren't you going to say your name?" It was my turn to interrupt, my grip on the rock tightening to show that I could still change my mind.

He looked at my hands before returning his gaze on me. He didn´t look very pleased about being forced to say his name, but I couldn't care less about it at the moment.

"Izaya" he said simply and grumpily.

I don´t know why, but seeing the snarky bastard so disgruntled filled me with certain pride. _"Not everything has to go your way"_ I thought.

"Now that the presentations are over" he said, all traces of the previous disgust gone from his face. "What are you doing here?" he said in an uninterested tone, then his voice went back to mockery. "You thought I would make a fine trophy and came to catch me?" he took his upper half of the water and rested his elbows on an especially flat rock near me. His head resting in the palm of his left hand while his eyes were now focused on the claws of his right one. For some reason I couldn´t take my eyes off him. "Because if that's the case…"

Suddenly, his free arm made a whip like movement and collided with my feet, making me lose my balance and falling on my side. Soon enough I felt the body of the siren crushing my chest with all its weight, immobilizing both of my arms with its tail. I opened my eyes to see the face of Izaya close to mine, and I felt the claws from his left hand pressing dangerously at my neck.

It was until then that I was so close to his face that I noticed that his eyes, while still glowing, were not as bright as last time. I could clearly remember that the first time I saw those eyes, they glowed with a deathly treat, but now… They were just a faint red. Also, I saw some marks at the side of his head near the eyes that seemed like they were made of dark blue scales. I was mesmerized.

"_One of the very first stories they told me when I got here was that these sirens look like the most beautiful creature in the world" the words I heard from Tom resounded through my mind._

I´ll be damned, I should have put more attention to my superior´s advice.

"What? Bewitched already?" the hidden laugh in the words made me go back to the present. This Izaya guy was laughing with an air of superiority while watching my face get hot. "And I haven´t even used my voice yet"

He was mocking me again. This bastard…!

I was going to use my strength to get the smartass off me when the claws at my neck reminded me of the situation at hand.

"No, no, no~" his voiced sing-sang. "Before any of that, you have to answer me~" he slowly put his face a mere inch from mine before continuing. At that distance, I could feel his breath on my face. His eyes were half lidded while mine were open like plates. "Did you told anyone about me?" his voice was now a mere whisper with a venomous undertone.

I felt the words enter my brain and for some reason I felt compelled to answer without a second of thought.

"No…" my voice sounded foreign in my ears. It was husky as if I hadn´t used it in hours.

I clearly saw his eyes go wide with surprise at my answer. In that second the mental fog in my head dispersed and I was able to think properly again. I took the chance and pushed the body of the siren off me, the action also snapping Izaya back to reality. He made a quick move to slash his claws at my arms but I managed to dodge the poisonous nails in the last second. Taken aback by my reflexes he opted for a kick of his tail right at my chest. Big mistake. I grabbed the muscle right at the beginning of its caudal fin and managed to get a firm grip with both hands. With a spin of my body I got enough pivot to launch his whole body crashing into the wall I had at my back. I saw the creature arc against the wall on impact, eyes wide open with pain. Then a second crash with the floor rendered the siren motionless.

I was panting when everything ended, the adrenaline in my blood stream subsiding. Slowly and very cautiously, I walked over to where the creature was, not moving anymore. When I was close enough to see his face expression I also noticed that some blood was starting to run down his side. His breath was elaborate and his eyes were clenched shut, a hand gently placed over the old wound that had reopened. When he felt me close, one of his eyes opened to regard me.

"Well…?" he panted, a little breathless. "Finish it already, I don't have all day…" even when his life could be finished with a single more blow from me, the snarky comments never ceased, huh…?

I sighed at the scene before me, ruffling my hair and wondering what I should do now. It wasn´t like this murderer really deserved any kind of compassion from me. He tried to attack me twice now and killed some of my fellow soldiers as well, not to mention that the only thing that came out from his mouth were insults and smartass comments. I opened my eyes to give another look over him.

"Ah, damn!" I screamed at myself before sitting down at the siren side and removing the hand off the wound.

"Oi! Don't!" when the pressure that the hand was making over the flesh disappeared the gash opened itself again. Izaya hissed at the motion, another sharp but tired glare was sent to me. "What are you…?!"

"Shut up" I said disregarding his question. "If can´t see it I'm not going to be able to stop the bleeding" I answered matter-of-factly. After inspecting the wound I reapplied pressure over it with my own hand.

That seemed to be enough to shut the bastard up, giving me time to look in my rucksack for what I needed. The wound wasn´t as big as to need suturing so a quick bandage and some ointment should do…

"What did you say…?" I heard him whisper incredulously when my attention returned to the wound.

"This will hurt" I said before spraying some disinfectant over the wound, noticing that the blood has already stopped coming and only the flesh remained open. It seemed like it was slightly infected, so this should make it better.

Another hiss was released by Izaya.

"That hurts, you brute!" he snapped at me.

"Good, it means its working" I said with a smirk of my own, seeing his face like that was pretty fun. "Now stop moving already, I have to bandage it before it gets infected again" I commanded, applying some ointment on it.

He huffed at my response, but complied anyways. I felt him take a deep breath before laying his whole body on the ground, his muscles relaxing a bit. Putting on a gauze bandage on the wound, I admired my work. Then I noticed that it probably wouldn't hold on with how much this guy moved. I looked for a good solution and, with the help of a larger bandage, held it in place, surrounding his waist with it. While doing so, I couldn´t help but notice the slim waist of the guy. What was he? Female? Or were all the siren males this feminine? It made me wonder. My eyes lingered on his body for a while longer than needed before returning my sight to his face.

It shouldn't surprise me that those eyes were once more on me and the usual smirk was back in place.

"Like what you see?" he asked, winking an eye.

"W-WHO WOULD..!?" I cursed mentally when I heard myself stammer, feeling my face grow hot in shame.

The cat like laugh of the siren echoed all over the place at my reaction, but stopped soon when the pain on the wound was enough to make him flinch.

"Ahaha…" the laugh finally died down completely. "I knew it, you are really an interesting human".

A small silence followed those strange words. They ringed a bell somewhere in my mind, but I couldn´t put my finger on it at the moment.

"Don't waste my efforts now, if you keep laughing like a maniac it will open again" I retorted, trying to change the topic back to the wound.

"Wouldn't you patch me again if that happened?" he asked in a fake innocent tone, flapping his eyelashes.

"LIKE HELL!" I answered, standing again and ready to take my leave of this damned place.

"Oi, Shizuo, wait!" I heard him call.

I stopped without turning back, a strange feeling rushing through me at the sound of my name in his voice. I strongly considered to ignore the call and just continue my exit, but something in his tone made me stay.

"What now?" I asked, glancing over my shoulder his way.

His sight immediately darted to the side, his upper half still resting on his elbows.

"You threw me over here, the least you could do is put me back in the water…" he mumbled with a tiny and upset tone.

I stared in disbelief at the development. Was this… His way to ask for a favor?

I couldn't contain my laugh at such a display. I doubled over grasping my stomach when it started to hurt.

"STOP LAUGHING!" he demanded, his face a deep frown but his red ears betrayed him.

Still laughing but less than before, I walked over to the siren and lifted his body from the ground. His arms immediately darted to my neck (With less deathly intentions) to balance himself. I smiled at him, the strange feeling intensifying when thinking that the guy was rather cute when he wasn´t acting almighty.

With a few large steps I arrived at the pond edge and, mindful of the bandage, placed the creature back in the water. Only when he was sure that he would fall inside the pond did he start to release my neck, not before sending another glance to my face, in the case I changed my mind and it showed on my expression. When his eyes reached mine though, it was like we were frozen in place. His eyes were really…

"_Beautiful…"_

I slapped myself mentally when the thought crossed my mind, my cheeks heating up for what felt like the tenth time in the past hour. I tore my eyes from that bewitching gaze and cleared my throat to coax the other to let go of me.

Quickly as if my skin burned him, his hands released me and the rest of him body fell to the pond. He returned to the surface and checked that the bandage didn't come off with the movement.

"Well…" I still couldn´t face him, my right fist over my mouth while I coughed uncomfortably. "I'll… Check on the bandage tomorrow" I stated to fill in the awkward silence.

"Sure" the other responded a little too soon to be normal.

I turned around set on getting out of here this time.

"Uhm… Thanks…" I heard a small whisper right before taking the first step inside the narrow alley that lead to the outside.

This time I really ignored it.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

Back at the base after my round was (finally) over, I received the news that some new soldiers were joining our ranks starting today. I didn't really care about such happening so I left it to Kadota and the others to welcome the new guys. I just needed my bed and some rest from any smartass bastard, really.

While walking down the halls, I stumbled upon another soldier that wasn't paying attention either.

"Ah, sorry…" I instinctively apologized, trying to continue my way.

"Superior Shizuo…?" a feminine familiar voice made me stop and regard the person properly.

My eyes immediately recognized that blond hair and purple eyes.

"Vorona…?"

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

_OtPr: First of all! I would like to apologize to all those who favorited/reviewed/followed my story and didn´t receive a chapter until today. I personally hate it when authors do this and I have no real excuse more than… I have no one to ship Shizaya with, so coming up with ideas about this story is becoming difficult. BUT! A friend of mine is helping me, and even though she doesn´t like Shizaya, she has been brainstorming this story and making me interested again. I have good news as well! I have the whole story planned now so I shouldn't drop it again for so long! Yey! Now, back to the story! Yes, I need to include Vorona here. What for? Oh, you will see… *malicious laugh*. Please tell me what your thoughts are about this chapter. Were the characters too out of it? Is the romance developing at the right pace? Any comment is gladly welcomed! See you soon! (I hope…)_


	4. Chapter 4

**Author´s Note:**OMG! Are you for real? Last chapter received TEN AWESOME REVIEWS! QAQ Guys I LOVE YOU! You totally ROCK! Thanks for your wonderful support and all the comments you give me, you seriously are my motivation to keep writing this! QWQ Now, because this had so many reviews (Cries of happiness) I will answer those I can by PM and the anon ones will be responded here. Okay? Okay!

**Guest:** Glad you liked it! Here is the next chapter! :3

**ZamE:** Aww! Thanks! I hope they remain IC on this chapter as well!

**ShiZayaUsUkSinJa:** You will have to keep reading and find out…? X3 BTW, love your penname xD

Okay, curtains up for chapter four!

**Chapter 4**

**Shizuo´s POV**

"So you did come back, huh?" Was the question that received me when I arrived to the cave the next day.

I tried to readjust my eyes to the darkness so I could recognize the figure of the siren in the water before answering.

"I said I would, didn´t I?" I responded back after a few seconds, my sight finally able to distinguish the white blur of Izaya´s body from the rest of the water. I slowly made my way to him, being careful not to fall inside the pond in the process.

"I thought it was common sense to never trust what a human says…" The answer made me stop mid-step, my mind trying to decipher what kind of tone was that and what it meant.

"Wha-Don't you have that backwards?" I asked, a chuckle escaping my lips at the absurdity of that. "It´s a siren the one you should never trust" My eyes were finally able to make out the guy´s expression.

His eyes, once more, were a little bit duller than last time, his whole face showing a bored and uninterested expression while resting his head on his arms at the shore. He looked like that for a few seconds before he scoffed a laugh, like if what I just said was completely idiotic.

"Now, why would you think that way, huh?"

I took a sit on the flat rock near the edge of the pond, motioning for the other to come out so I could check the bandage, like I said I would. He went underwater (To hydrate himself, I assume) before jumping out and sitting in front of me, his back now facing me.

"Oh, I don´t know" I continued the conversation, my hands taking off the bandage so I could check on the wound development. "Because they are tricky and deceptive? They will try to drown you when they get the chance?"

I didn´t need to see his face (He was facing the other way anyways) to know that he was silently laughing at my comment, his frame shaking up and down giving him away. It made my task just slightly more difficult, but I could still verify that the wound was finally on its way to properly healing.

"I could say the same right back at you about humans, couldn´t I?" He said, looking over his shoulder at me right when I turned to pull out some more ointment and a new clean bandage from my rucksack. "Well, except the part about drowning us…" He continued, directing his gaze at the ceiling as if entertaining the idea of a drowning siren. "And if that were true about us, you would be dead since yesterday" He concluded, directing his eyes on me and narrowing them with a sadistic smile.

It was my turn to laugh again. Is not every day that someone threatens me after knowing about my strength, they were never that stupid.

"Right, as if you didn't try that the first time AND yesterday as well" I retorted, sending his way that toothy grin I was so famous for back at the base. In any other context, it would serve as a warning to stop whatever the fuck was going on and scram, but today… It just lacked the threat. "I´m still alive, though" I concluded offhandedly, returning to the injury.

I quickly applied some more ointment on the wound before putting the new bandage in place. Izaya was silent after the last exchange, so I finished without stopping anymore. When I was done I gave the bandage a small pat, making the other notice that I was done.

The siren quickly jumped back to the water, splashing some on my face in the process, before resurfacing and checking the bandage. He started to probe the area were the wound should be. I assumed he must be testing it to see if what I was doing was really helping or not.

"_Not even a thank you, huh? Discourteous little prick…"_ I mentally commented, running a palm over my face to get rid of the water that had splashed me.

When I opened my eyes again, Izaya was watching me with a serious expression, but his eyes didn´t look as sure as the rest of his face.

He looked confused.

"What?" I quacked, confused as well. "Too tight?" That was the only conclusion my mind could come up with to justify such a reaction from the other.

He kept his half glare on me before diverting his eyes and huffing, as if resigned. He mumbled something, but it was so low that I couldn´t make it out.

"What are you, a flea?" I asked, getting annoyed by the behavior of the raven. "Louder" I commanded, putting away all the tools I had used on Izaya, ready for whatever the other was going to complain about.

His face snapped my way once more, offended by the comment I made. _"Eh… That´s a good face"_ I noticed, making the mental note to use that nickname again if I got the chance.

"I said," he answered, his tone now clear and slightly annoyed. "That humans are not supposed to be like this" He finished.

I let the words and their meaning sink in for a minute before answering.

"What do you know about humans?" I asked, surprisingly calm. The reason why could be that Izaya looked like a wounded animal (Well, he actually WAS like a wounded animal), ready to slash at the slightest provocation.

His face though, despite my best intentions, turned more severe.

"You're wrong if you think that I don´t know your kin" He said, his tone as venomous as it was during our first encounter. My eyes widened just a bit at that, not expecting my words to have the opposite effect. "You make excuses to hunt us down when you are the ones who should be labeled as liars and tricksters" He spat while his hand ghostly patted the wound on his side.

I caught the movement and my mind quickly ran back to the bodies of those soldiers that we found weeks ago. The signs of something thrashing along the path of shoeprints… And the scratches all over their arms and chests…

"_Could it be…That Izaya didn´t actually murdered them on cold blood, but killed them to defend his life…?"_ The thought ran through my mind when the pieces started to fall together. If that was true… But wait… Did he say hunt? What was he talking about? Humans avoid sirens, why would we hunt them down…?

I shook my head, trying to slow down the speed of my thoughts before they got out of hand. Why should I believe whatever this creature says anyways? I have been warned more than enough about the way they trick people with their words and bodies. It should be expected that whatever that comes out from that mouth is as good as a lie, no matter how tear-jerking.

Wait, no… I have never actually seen a siren doing anything of the sort to believe that… But is not like I can believe whatever Izaya says either…

I groaned closing my eyes, my thoughts getting too damned confusing and frustrating. I concluded that I had to reach to my own conclusion by my own means before I took a stance on this matter. That decision didn´t make my internal battle any less complicated.

My right eye twitched and I suddenly itched for a smoke, but this wasn´t the more ventilated place to have one, so I conformed myself with scratching the back of my head to vent some frustration. I remained like that before a small laugh brought me back to the cave.

"What? Did your pea-sized brain just shut down?" Izaya sounded like he was having fun by watching the parade of emotions run over my body.

I glared at him, not very happy with the comparison.

"Look, "I spat with frustration. "I don´t know about you, but I have heard enough shit about y'all to not trust one of your kind in my life" I said, noticing how the other's mocking smile dropped from his face to be replaced by that severe glare again. "And you haven´t really given me any reasons to think differently" I reasoned. "But, if there´s something I have learned is to never judge something without knowing it well" I said firmly, looking right at his eyes with no hesitation, trying to calm him down.

His eyes wavered for just a second there, he faced the other way.

"The worst type of humans out there have sincere eyes like yours…" he whispered again, but this time I was able to catch it.

His words stung me, not because I was hurt that he thought badly of me, but because it made me wonder what kind of experience could have made him think like that...

It made me want to change his impression about humans.

"As I said, you can believe whatever you want" I was finally able to answer back. "I have already decided that I will treat you as you show me you deserve to be treated" My mind was set. "The rest is up to you" I crossed my arms over my chest.

He looked at my eyes intently, looking for any trace of doubt. The severity left his face slowly before he put on a disbelieving smile.

"Such a fool, that trusting attitude will get you killed one day" He said, closing his eyes, shaking his head and shrugging his shoulders. Still, the smile didn´t left his face. "Alright! So let's start all over again!" He exclaimed with the enthusiasm of a child when given a new toy. "Orihara Izaya, siren" He said, putting his trademark smirk this time.

I sighed with the sudden change of attitude from the other, but smiled when I felt the tension finally left the atmosphere. "Heiwajima Shizuo, human" I said, extending a hand in his direction.

He looked at my hand with a raised brow in confusion, not knowing what I was expecting of him. I rolled my eyes.

"This is a handshake, you're supposed to grab my hand" I explained as simple as I possibly could.

Still looking unsure, he grabbed my hand awkwardly. I firmly grasped his and gave it a small shake. He watched the exchange with curious eyes and I found that most of his reactions were like a child´s. They were quite cute.

"_Okay, that´s the second time I think that"_ I wanted to slap myself for that, and make it double for keeping the count.

I released the hand of Izaya before getting up and dusting myself off, preparing to leave and continue my patrol for the day. However, when I picked up my rucksack, one of the crab cakes I had inside rolled off and fell into the water with a splat.

I was about to just pick it up again but stopped when I saw Izaya getting near the food and poking it with one of his nails.

"What-What is that?" He asked with a frown.

"Huh? It´s a crab cake" I responded right away. "Food" I added for good measure.

The siren definitely recognized the word because his eyes immediately shined with a ravenous glint and in a quick motion shoved the entire cake into his mouth, munching like his life depended on it. I heard a gasp before his eyes returned to me.

"I-It´s good!" He exclaimed with an amazed expression. "Do you have more?"

The sincerity on his face took me by surprise. I just nodded and took out the rest of the package, which contained another two crab patties. The raven jumped out of the water to snatch them out of my hands before devouring them again. His cheeks took on a pink blush while he was breathing them in.

The whole display made me wonder if the guy was starving himself… _"Thinking back now… What does he eat here? Is this pond even connected to the sea?"_ I wondered. The thought of the siren not having anything to eat since coming here made a lump in my throat.

"O-oi," I called, making him turn my way, his cheeks still round with mouthfuls. "I can bring you some more tomorrow, if you want" I offered.

He swallowed the food and looked at me with eyes wide open, suddenly looking as if I was offering him the keys of heaven.

"Would you really do that?" He asked, disbelief evident in his voice.

I just nodded.

"Thanks, Shizu-chan!" He exclaimed, eyes narrowing because the smile he threw at me was so wide and so sincere that occupied almost all of his face.

And I felt the need to slap myself for the third time that day.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

I found myself walking around the night market later that day.

When I arrived back to the base after my patrol (Ready to take a nap, mind you), I was informed that we were running out of supplies and that I was nominated by my dear friends to go pick up everything that was needed.

It comes without saying that some chairs were thrown at Kadota and my other so called dear friends before I agreed to do anything. I hated to go shopping anyways. Luckily, one of my juniors, Vorona, volunteered herself to help me.

So here I was, walking around the night stalls of Sagena, trying to complete the unbelievably long list of supplies before it was time to close the market for the day. At least Vorona was silent and only spoke when necessary. She was the one doing most of the deals with the merchants because when they caught a glance at my face, they would try to make a run for it. Seriously, I was getting more pissed off by the second.

"We have almost everything that has been required, I can handle the rest of this request by my own, senior Shizuo" she spoke suddenly, most likely catching on my mood.

She has always been like that. Even when we were just upcoming students at the militia academy, she would notice my temper just before it snapped and would try to stop me from getting any angrier. I think that if it weren´t for her, I would have been kicked out from the academy a long time ago.

She was one of those persons I could be with without getting pissed so much.

"Are you sure?" I asked.

"Affirmative" she quickly responded. "Besides, you already are carrying too much. Any more would be impossible to fit through the base door" he concluded, signaling to the mountain of stuff that I was carrying around on one arm.

"_Eh…? So much already?" _I haven´t even noticed.

"Alright, thanks for that" I agreed, relieved that I didn´t need to deal with any more scared merchants for the day.

"No need to thank me" she continued while I was turning around to leave. "It is what I want to do" she added, a little more quiet than usual.

I turned my head with a raised brow to look at her, but she was already heading the other way with the list of supplies in front of her face. I just shrugged it off and continued the walk back.

Even though it was so late already, the market was still full of life. Most of them being elderly people, merchants selling their goods and couples taking strolls around the food and games stalls. The younger ones long gone to bed by the looks of it.

While watching the night life detachedly, one of the stalls caught my attention. I deviated myself a little to take a good look at the stall.

It was a traditional oriental food stand. There were rice balls with different fillings, some sweet and other salty. There were also balls of fried octopus covered in sauce and some boxes filled with different cuts of fish rolled with rice and seaweed. I picked a set of rice balls and my mind quickly wondered if Izaya has ever tasted some of these…

And my mind came to a sudden stop.

"_Did I just really thought…?" _My mental rant was halted before it could even begin by the seller of the food.

"Oho! Young gentleman, would you like to try some of these exotic oriental delicacies?" He asked, eyeing me up and down.

I snapped back to reality and turned to the man. Then back to the box of rice balls before putting it back to the whole display before turning to continue my path.

"Aww, come on! Don´t be like that!" the man exclaimed before putting himself in front of me. "How about I offer you a deal?" He said, and before I could brush him off my way he continued. "You purchase two of whichever packs you want, and I give you a free pack of Pocky!"

I raised a brow at that.

"What the hell is a pocky?"

"Oh, they are a type of sweet very popular at the other side of the world! And you can play a _very_ interesting game with them!" the man suddenly lowered his voice, making me get closer to him so I could hear him. "First, you need someone else to play the game with" He announced, his voice getting only lower. "Then, you put one of the ends of the pocky on your mouth and the other end goes into the other person´s" I gulped at that. "And you start biting on the stick, making it smaller and smaller until…" My face was red with the imminent conclusion my mind has reached. "You kiss!"

I jumped at that, since the man had decided to yell the last part on my ear. I glared at him but once more was interrupted before voicing my annoyance.

"Or the person who breaks the pocky first loses, whichever comes first" He concluded, shrugging. "So… What do you say? Wanna try that with your girlfriend?" He jabbed at my ribs, raising both of his brows in a suggestive gesture.

I found no excuse to stop my disgust from being voiced, making some of the neighboring stands to close their business in fear that I decided to yell at them as well.

But I still arrived back to my room with a bag of rice balls, a wooden box of sushi rolls and a suspicious looking bag of bread sticks coated in a thin layer of chocolate.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

_OtPr: Oh my goodness! I know that this is not the longest chapter so far, but it is certainly my favorite! (So far x3) I want to know what you think of this story. How do you feel about these Izaya and Shizuo? Is Izaya too random? And! Any idea that you may have for the story. I have all of this planned out, but that doesn´t mean I cannot include some of your ideas on it ;3. Once more, I love you all my awesome readers and hope you enjoyed this chappy as much as I did. Hope to read your fabulous reviews soon!_


	5. Chapter 5

**Author´s note:** I have no excuse this time. I can only hope that those of you who are still reading this can find it in your hearts to forgive me ;3; Now, I hope you enjoy this chapter as much as I did while writing it. Is full of new ideas that I needed to introduce to keep the story going! I want to personally thank my beta and my BFF Naria who helped me not only correct this story but make it artsy and rhythmic for you!

**Guest:** You are very welcome! Sorry for the delay!

**ShiZayaUsUkSinJa: **Hohoho, a good angst story always have one. I personally love them x3 Hope you like the next chappy!

**An:** Ugh! And after watching the last chapter of DRRR x2 I hate her even more! But that aside, thanks for your comment and I hope you enjoy the next chapter :3

**Chapter 5**

**Shizuo´s POV**

I was once more siting inside of the cave, watching as Izaya taste-tested the food that I have brought him today. Some sautéed vegetables that were served during yesterday's dinner and a piece of the caramel apple I ate on my round at the market. It was kinda amusing watching him react to the different types of food. Especially the sweet ones.

"_Pwaj_, this is too much sugar on a naturally sweet fruit" he spit the piece of candy out of his mouth with a weird curse.

I chuckled, knowing already the reaction that the candies usually brought.

The past few weeks have been kind of hectic. Between rounds, training, visiting the flea AND feeding it, I can confidently say that my life here had taken a turn for the busiest ever since meeting the red eyed myth. But I can also say that is has been less boring than I thought it would be.

"Why don't you bring more of those fatty tuna rolls that you brought that time?" The siren whined while he rested his upper body on the shore near me.

"How can you like fish? Isn't that like cannibalism?" I responded back, closing my eyes. "Besides, that was expensive, are you going to pay me for that?" I added like the money was of some importance.

It wasn't. But denying Izaya some satisfaction was plenty amusing to let it slide. The siren let out another whine.

"What do you think we eat out in the sea, oxygen and light? We are not plants mind you" He retorted, resting his head face down, consciously ignoring the payment part.

Out of all the things that I have come to learn with Izaya, the thing that we notice the most is how badly informed we are about each other. I find myself constantly making jokes that can only be explained when you were raised within a human society and Izaya sometimes utters words that can only be described as fish language. Or that's what I call it, at least.

I still haven't told anyone about these meetings with Izaya in the cave. The animosity that the villagers seem to have against his kin has restrained me from uttering a word about the matter. Tom would have been my first option to share this information with, but he looks like the mere mention of sirens would put him into alert mode. Let's not think what he would do if he knew that I was frequently meeting one of them willingly.

We remained in silence for a little bit more than a minute before I decided to add another question to our already long list.

"I've been wondering" I started, drawing his attention to me. "How did you end up in here? And with that wound"

The now-more-than-before ever glowing eyes looked at me directly for a second before he rested his face on his arms again. For a moment I thought that he will just pretend that I didn't ask anything at all like all the times before whenever I asked personal questions. I was ready to get up and leave when a whisper was heard from his direction.

"Some bad decisions" he uttered without lifting his face, so the voice was muffled and distant.

"Care to be more specific?" I asked, trying to summon some more patience to not get frustrated at the vagueness of the answer.

"Why, Shizu-chan, aren't you interested in that matter? May I ask why?" He lifted his face, putting on that mask of mockery that he usually wore when trying to change the topic of the conversation. It was annoying as hell but I couldn't do anything if Izaya didn't want to speak about it. "Is not like it concerns you anyways, or does it now?" He whispered in a playful tone.

I decided that the conversation was going nowhere and that it was time for me to leave for the day.

"How about you?" The question got me by surprise. I turned around to look at him again. "Why do you keep coming?"

"Would you prefer if I didn't?" I asked while propping a brow.

"I can't say…" he started with a sly smile "that it hasn't been interesting with you coming here…" He concluded offhandedly. "But what about you?"

I took a moment to analyze the reason why I kept coming here. There was really nothing for me here to keep coming for, but seeing the merman gladly devour the food that I brought and come up with some small talk was something that I looked forward to everyday. It became a routine to which I quickly adapted myself, to the point where I would wonder what was I doing before this even started.

"I don't know" I responded back truthfully. "It's amusing, I guess"

I looked at him with the corner of my eye, just to catch how his gaze was analyzing my every expression once more. He often did that and at the beginning I suspected that it was because he did not trust me so he would do that to check if I was lying about anything, but now I was starting to think that he just plain liked to see my reactions.

"Why do you do that?" My curiosity finally getting the best of me.

He blinked. "Do what?"

"That thing, like watching my face very intently" I elaborated, trying to get my point through.

He blinked once and then his face broke into a mischievous smile.

"My, aren't you bold today, Shizu-chan?" He said, hiding half of his face behind his hand, feigning to be blushing while I could tell that he was just laughing and teasing me.

I groaned at the evasive behavior and turned to leave once more.

"See ya tomorrow, flea" I said while waving an arm in the air.

"Bring those tuna rolls with you!" He requested one more time.

A small smile broke into my face at that. This bastard doesn't know when to give up, does he?

oOoOoOoOoOo

Back at the base, I decided that I needed to flex my muscles so I asked Tom to spar with me for a bit in the training ground. We grabbed some wooden swords and started a friendly match.

Very slowly, some of the other guys started to gather around us. Some decided to start their own matches while others, more sadistic, just wanted to see how a match against "the monster Heiwajima" would end. The fame of my rampages at the base had spread like a legend among the soldiers and the newer ones must have wanted to see the truth by themselves.

Too bad I wasn't using my strength at all, the whole point of the session just being to be able to hone my reflexes and get some more training done. Tom was aware that I would not harm him, so we were both enjoying some exercise like we did back at the academia. All in all, you could say my mind was at peace.

_Clunk!_

The noise of a helmet colliding at the back of my head interrupted the previous chattering noises and all activity in general. I could feel the myriad of stares sent in my direction and how the temperature seemed to have dropped almost instantaneously. Tom moved to the side a little and was looking right past me with a disappointed and almost pitying stare.

I turned around and took notice of the general intake of air that the action caused. I quickly located the lonely helmet a few feet away from me as well as the empty head where the helmet must have come from. It looked like some rookies where sparring with lances and one of them had made a strong lunge that the other barely evaded. Luckily (Or not) the helmet seemed to be the only one damaged.

I sheathed the sword and took the helmet on my way to the newbies. When I was right in front of them I raised my hand with the helmet on it and the atmosphere tensed around us. The face of the soldier in front of me could have been the same as if he was looking right at the eyes of death. For the first time, I thought that such a reaction was kind of funny.

_Clack._

I put the helmet on the soldiers head with a smooth move.

"Watch it, you two" I said, finally breaking the choking silence. "These may be for training but you can still hurt someone with that kind of thrust". I turned around to go back to Tom and retire for the day. My body was relaxed so it should be enough to get a good night of sleep.

My actions caused several gasps and a trembling voice behind me uttered a loud: "Y-yes, Superior Shizuo!"

When I returned, Tom was looking at me as if I had sprouted an extra head.

"What?" I asked annoyed at all the attention I was getting.

"No, nothing…" Tom started, as if trying to decide whether to ask or not.

"I think this is enough for today" I voiced, making my way to the weapon rack to put away the wooden sword. Tom followed closely behind. "Man, I'm beat. And I still need to go to the market…" I mumbled, remembering the sushi rolls that Izaya had requested. _'Not that I need to buy them, really", _I considered mentally.

We started walking towards our room while I debated if going to the market or not. I was seriously considering not going at all when someone called me, interrupting my thoughts.

"Yo, Shizuo" I turned to look at the end of the hall and saw Kadota there, finishing a conversation with his roommate, a languid guy named Togusa.

We stopped in our tracks. He made his way to us.

"What's up?"

"Heard that you got hit at the training ground and didn't smash any heads" He commented with an amused smile.

We blinked at that.

"Wha-How did you know?" Tom mouthed the question that we both had. "That happened just a minute ago!"

"Haha, you shouldn't underestimate the power of a good gossip in such a small place" Kadota laughed at that. "Anyways, is good to hear you are in such a good mood" He commented, patting my shoulder on his way to the opposite direction.

We saw Kadota walk away until he turned at the end of the hall and out of our sight. I was replaying the whole scene in my mind while asking myself if I should have gotten mad back then when I noticed the sidelong glance that Tom was giving me.

"What?" I asked, irked.

He just continued walking without answering.

oOoOoOoOoOo

"Isn't there something you want to tell me?" Tom asked the moment he closed the door to our room.

"About?" I asked, removing the sweaty clothes that I had on.

"I don't know" he responded in a strange tone of voice that I haven't heard him use before. "Maybe about your secret meetings?"

I tensed at the insinuation, but tried to keep my cool. _"Calm down. Tom can't be referring to Izaya. I mean, I haven't done anything for him to suspect a thing" _I tried to reassure myself, but my mind was still reeling with a thousand possibilities that may have made Tom ask something like this.

"What are you talking about?" I managed without turning to face him, quickly picking up some clean clothes from the closet.

"Don't act dumb now" He responded in a serious tone that made me look his way. "When were you planning on telling me about this?" He was looking directly into my eyes with a disapproving stare.

"_That's it, he knows"_ I mentally groaned. I don't know since when or how but he knows about Izaya. I turned to completely face him, ashamed that he had found out about this without me being the one who told him.

"Look Tom, I know what you are going to say… and don't think I didn't think of telling you about this before! But you were just so shocked because of the attacks that I didn't know how to crack the news for you and before I…" Tom waved his hands furiously in front of me, making my rant stop.

"Wait, wait, wait!" He looked at me, incredulous. "Are you trying to say that this has been going on ever since those attacks?"

"Well, it started like a week later or so" I explained in a small tone. "It was during one of my rounds and-"I suddenly stopped when Tom decided to graciously smack my back with an open hand.

"Shizuo, you dog!" He barked with a grin.

The action took me completely unguarded. He was… happy? I looked at him, weighing the possibility that Tom had lost it or his hostility towards the sirens was all just an act.

"You… You are happy?" my voice was barely there.

"'Course I am!" he clarified, with both hands at his hips. "This is great Shizuo! Of course I'm happy for you!"

"_Okay…? That was weird" _I noted.

"Thanks, though I don't think this is something to get so happy about…" I commented, a little creeped by the weird behavior that my superior was showing.

I mean, sure. I do think that being friends with a siren (If that's what we were at all) was definitely a good thing to get to the bottom of all these legends and everything, but something to get happy about?

"What do you mean?" Tom looked at me as if I was the one who had lost it. "We should be celebrating this with some beer!"

"_Now, this is REALLY weird" _Tom surely was joking now. _"A way to deal with the fear he was feeling, perhaps?" _added a voice that sounded strikingly like the flea's.

"You should have let me know earlier Shizuo, really. Are we not friends? Sure, I did notice your change of heart these past weeks, but I never realized that this was…." He stopped his rant and looked at me proudly. "I should have known though. The smiles, the general good mood, the lack of flying heavy objects around camp… Of course you met someone!"

Very slowly, as if the gears in my brain remembered how to move again, all of Tom's reaction started to make sense to me. The blood rushing to my head and heating my face was just to oxygenate my brain, that's what I told myself.

"A-actually Tom, is not…" I started out, but Tom was still deep in his monologue to pay any attention to my attempt to clarify things.

"But nevermind that. When were you planning on presenting us? You were, right?" Tom asked eagerly, finally looking at me again.

The look on Tom's face made me stop and think twice about popping his bubble.

"Tom, I…" I looked all around the room, trying to figure out a way out of this mess without breaking his illusion.

"Come on. There is nothing to get embarrassed about!" He said, punching my arm lightly. "I just want to know the lucky girl who caught your attention. Not gonna try and steal her from you, promise!"

"Tom…" I guess the faster I do this the less damage it could make. "Listen, it is not-"

_Knock, knock, knock._

We darted our eyes to the door, Tom a little annoyed at the interruption while I was deeply relieved at the momentaneous letup.

"Come in…" He sighed, somewhat disappointed.

The knob turned quickly to reveal Vorona on the other side of the door with a laundry basket that looked huge in her arms. She looked a little flustered. Surely the basket was too heavy.

"Excuse my intrusion… I'm collecting the dirty sheets for laundry tomorrow…" She explained, in a quick and small tone uncharacteristically of her.

I quickly got away from Tom and went over, my dirty clothes in hand, and took the basket from her arms.

"Let me help you with this" I smiled at her. I desperately needed an excuse to get out of there and this was my chance.

"This task has been assigned to me, I should not involve others in such a-"she started with that almost automat tone of voice.

"I insist" I cut in, trying to explain with my eyes that I needed her to agree.

She looked me in the eye for a moment before nodding.

"Thank you for your help" she formally thanked me.

We left the room, leaving a confused and curious Tom behind.

"Vorona maybe?" he asked to no one in specific.

oOoOoOoOoOo

I helped Vorona finish collecting the laundry of the day. That was the least I could do after I blatantly used her as an escape route just a few minutes ago. She was against it at first, but quickly gave in. She seemed distant, but I decided not to ask about it.

"Thank you for what you did back there", I mentioned, emptying the last basket. I turned around to see her mystified look. "I don't know what I would've done if you hadn't interrupted when you did, so thanks" I clarified.

"There is no need to thank me for that" she said monotonously. "Actually, I think I need to apologize to you" she added, looking directly at me.

I propped a brow, "What for?"

"I overheard your conversation before knocking the door" she said almost with no change, but I saw a shadow of hesitation cross her face for just a second. "My intention was to assess that I wasn't about to interrupt something important, but there is no excuse for eavesdropping on such a personal conversation. I deeply apologize for that" she concluded, bowing her head a little to show that she meant it.

I could feel a cold sweat break at my nape, remembering the topic of that conversation and what must have been that she heard through the door. I scoffed, trying to calm down.

"It's okay. You don't have to apologize for something like that. I know you didn't mean anything bad" I said, making her lift her head again. Her intent stare made me turn away a little and scratch my nose before continuing, "But I would appreciate if you didn't tell anyone about what you heard."

"Why?"

"Well… You know people tend to overreact whenever I'm involved in any rumor…" I said vaguely, avoiding her gaze but I could still feel her watching me, waiting for me to elaborate. "I just don't want more people at my neck. I have more than enough with Tom as it is"

Her face hardened, as if debating whether she should ask about it or drop the topic altogether. I waited for a few more seconds for her to continue, but she didn't. I took that as my queue to leave.

Well… Good work today" I waved a hand as I hurriedly left the room.

I exhaled a sigh when I was finally outside, relieved that I had somehow gotten away from Tom and Vorona. Those conversations were more nerve-wracking than they should have. _"Hopefully Vorona will not delve into this any further and will just eventually forget the conversation with Tom. But Tom…"_

I was already a few steps away from the door of the laundry room when the same door opened again in an urgent manner.

"Superior Shizuo!"

I turned around surprised.

"Yes?" I uttered as calmly as I could.

"I… Uhm…" she wasn't acting like she normally did, all collected and cool, that made me worry a bit. "Thank you for your help" she ended up saying.

"Anytime" I answered, attempting to continue my walk, debating whether I should worry for her or just leave her alone.

"Where are you going?"

I froze; I was heading to the market to get the damned tuna rolls for Izaya, but there was no way I could tell her that.

"The market, there is something I wanted…" I answered, trying my best to sound offhandedly.

"I see…" I heard her say.

I kept walking without turning around this time, not letting her ask if she could tag along. I knew myself enough to know that I wouldn't be able to come up with an excuse as to why I wanted to purchase sushi, especially to Vorona who knew I despised raw meats.

oOoOoOoOoOo

The next day I headed directly to the cave after I was done with my round at the market, the sushi rolls securely packed in my rucksack.

Today's round had been relatively calm, but I couldn't shake off the feeling that someone had been watching me all day.

The feeling even extended when I wasn't at the market anymore but I ignored it anyways and I completely forgot all about it when the siren decided to tackle me head on the moment I arrived at the pond.

I heard myself make a weird noise when the air was knocked out of me by Izaya, falling on my back flat on the floor.

"That's all it took to take you down? How boring!" he laughed at his prank.

I groaned as pain bloomed at the back of my head. "What do you expect when I wasn't even ready?"

"You are a soldier, are you not? Aren't you supposed to be ready for combat at all times?" he debated, resting his head on one hand while the other entertained a long nail at my neck.

I thought that I was already used to Izaya's random attacks, but it seems that he still managed to find a way to throw me off balance every once in a while. I tried to get up using my elbows and Izaya quickly removed himself off me, going back to the pond. Thanks to his little prank, now my shirt and pants were wet at the front. I threw him a glare when his head popped out of the water. He just smiled innocently as if he had done nothing wrong.

"Well yeah, but that's only when you are in danger" I scoffed an answer, getting up from the floor and taking my usual seat in the flat rock by the shore.

"So being ultimately defenseless in a dark and small place with a dangerous creature such as myself doesn't count as dangerous in Shizu-chan´s book, hmm?" Izaya said in a mocking tone. "Shizu-chan is really more of a monster than I am"

"Shut up" I liked our conversations, but whenever Izaya started to rant like that I found myself at the verge of my patience with every sentence. "Besides, I'm not ultimately defenseless"

He whistled at that, an action that I had taught him a few weeks prior. This bastard learned things quick and the annoying ones even faster.

"So Shizu-chan knows big words like 'ultimately', huh?"

For the sake of keeping the conversation going, I decided to ignore that. Too bad I was not able to stop that vein from popping into my forehead.

"I have my sword at all times, and when that fails…" I lifted a hand in front of me and fisted it tightly. "There is always this monstrous strength".

"Just like an animal…" He whispered.

I couldn't ignore that anymore.

"Seems like you are in a good mood today, huh?" I smiled the warning toothy grin that I have come to perfect. "That means you don't need any sushi, right?"

"So you did bring them?" The siren asked in an actually surprised tone, his eyes sparkling at the thought.

"It seems that you don't want them, though"

I looked at the siren as he seemed to have an internal fight with himself. His glowing eyes turned to slits as he weighed the options for a few seconds before his face relaxed in an easy grin. I propped a brow at that. "_Giving up?_"

Izaya started to swim closer and when he was close enough, he propped his upper body out of the water, putting his elbows on both of my knees and looking at me directly in the eyes. I took on the challenge, not backing down and keeping an unwavering gaze on his face. He chuckled a little.

"Shizu-chan, do you even understand the position you are in?" he said, closing his eyes even more to the point where I could barely see their red glow right in front of me. "You know that of all the legends you've heard from sirens, one of them is actually true, right?"

I gulped at the proximity. The threat on his voice was serious but there was no way I was going to give this bastard the pleasure of victory with just a puny warning like that. I put on a strong front to face what was coming. The red eyes shined with an amused glint at my opposition and Izaya started to get even closer to my face, but my pride prevented me from moving away.

"I would just need to use my voice a little…" he whispered in a throaty voice. His body was now supported only on one of his hands, placed conveniently in the space between my legs while his other hand had reached out for my chin and held my face in place.

I remained frozen. I could tell without even trying that if I had wanted to, I would have been able to overthrow him. But some other force had me still in that rock. Be it the foreign situation, the fact that a siren was getting dangerously close after threating me or that this siren was Izaya himself, I didn't know. I just became aware of the awkwardness of it all when he was so close to me that the water dripping from his body started to fall over my suddenly hot chest. At that point, I could even feel his breathing on one side of my face, getting ever so close to my ear. I put on my best poker face but I felt how my heart rate started to escalate to heights where I worried if Izaya would be able to hear them.

At some point during this new attack, Izaya´s eyes had moved out of my sight, but when I noticed that the other had stopped moving, I quickly searched for his face. And I found it, his eyes were already over my own. The red glow of his orbs caught my breath immediately and the word _"Beautiful"_ flew through my head again. He watched me for a few seconds with wide open eyes, as if just realizing something, before he let go of my face and snatched something from my side all too quick.

I could only watch as Izaya submerged back into the pond, leaving outside one arm with the sushi pack that I had in my bag. I immediately turned around to verify that indeed, the flea had snatched it out of my rucksack while I was distracted.

"Or I can just do this" He said, waving the package victoriously in front of me.

"Tch. Sneaky bastard…" I mumbled, pretending to be upset at the frustration of my attempt to prevent him from getting the sushi.

Izaya wasted not a single moment to tear the elaborated wrapping of the box to shreds, getting to his precious tuna rolls. The instant he could, he threw one of them on his mouth; his throat making a purr-like sound. I smiled at that. This whole siren deal was just like having a cat.

I threw a sidelong glance at Izaya again.

"_An oversized cat that loved the water and could potentially kill you"_, my mind decided to remind me. Still, all the reactions, the preference of fish and random attacks reminded me of those of a cat, plus the elegance of his moves and those moments where he looked kinda cute… _"I should stop that train of thought right there",_ I scoffed a little.

"Ne, Shizu-chan" Izaya called to me, successfully making me focus on the present again.

"What?"

"From where do you get these tuna rolls?" He asked, and his tone sounded all too innocent.

I examined him for a second, weighing the chances that this was just one of his stupid jokes or if he was honestly curious.

"There is a market that opens only at night and has these stalls that sell festival food…" I explained, trying to use words that I have explained to him before.

"Festival food? What kind of food is that?" He asked, throwing another roll in his mouth.

"Well… Is food that is normally sold at festivals…? Is not like your everyday food, these are more… Unhealthy?" I tried explaining, searching for a word that would describe the difference between normal food and festival food. More fried? Sugary?

"And what is a festival?" There it was, the face that Izaya put on when he was so curious about something that he would not let the topic rest until he was satisfied.

"A festival…" I wracked my brain for the correct words, but I simply couldn´t come up with them. I sighed. "Is something too complicated to explain" I scratched the back of my head, trying to avoid his gaze because I knew what kind of expression he was making. That stupid puppy face that contrasted terribly with his bright red eyes, making it more creepy than compelling. And he made it everytime he didn´t get what he wanted. "It would be easier if I could take you there to show you…" I mumbled as an after-thought.

"Would you really?" I heard him whisper, a little too low.

"Yeah sure" I subconsciously continued.

He took a few seconds to just watch me. This time, I knew he was examining my intentions and not just analyzing my face.

"Do you mean that?" He finally asked, and I noticed that the low tone from before was actually him being cautious. This put me off for a second.

Izaya had stopped adopting this behavior after our first two weeks of these meetings. Something must be bothering him. I sat as straight as I could and meet him directly in the eyes, trying my best to convey my feelings.

"I do" I responded honestly. "But I don´t suppose that the citizens will take it lightly if I suddenly waltzed around the market plaza with a siren in my arms" I joked a bit, trying to lift the tense mood.

I felt my cheeks heat up a little at the image that my statement proposed, but I managed to keep my cool just enough to notice that Izaya averted his eyes in another direction.

"I wouldn´t be in your arms…"

"What?" He was still mumbling, so I wasn´t sure I had heard him right.

"There is a way you can show me around the city" He said, louder than before.

It took me a moment to process that.

"I´m not getting you a water tank either"

He looked dumbstruck for a second before he broke a laugh, hugging one of my legs so he wouldn´t go underwater during his fit. His laugh offended me a little, but I let it slide since the previous mood had finally evaporated.

"Don´t be stupid! Hahaha!" He finally managed. "How could you even…? Ha, nevermind that" Izaya composed himself once more, putting his chin on the knee of the leg that he was still holding. "Shizu-chan, would you show me what a festival is if I had legs?"

oOoOoOoOoOo

_OtPr: Please be honest with me! Do you find these cliffhangers tiring? Makes you not want to keep reading? There´s not much I can do about them since I need to cut the emotion at that moment but I want to know if you find them discouraging x3 Anyhow! What do you think? Like the idea so far? Ufufufufu, I´m finally getting to where I wanted this to go ;3 See you in next chappy! And don´t forget to give me your comments about this story, I love to read them over and over again! X3_


	6. Chapter 6

**Author´s note:** Yeey! I updated on time! Hahaha, now really, I will try to update at least once a month, I promise! Once more, I want to thank you all who review/favorite/follow my story. Everytime I get one of those emails my day brightens up! I love you guys! And again, a special thanks to my beta Naria for helping me out even if she doesn´t ship the pairing, and Jenny, who knows nothing about anime but helps me out when I can't find the right word xD Now for the anonymous section!

**dara:** Thank you for your lovely review! I'm sorry that I can't update daily but I can assure you I am WRITING daily! I hope you keep liking the romance!

**ShiZayaUsUkSinJa: **I'm so glad to hear you loved the previous chapter so much! You know, I didn't quite understood what you meant about hating love triangles until your previous review? Hahaha! I also hate those stories where the MC cannot decide whether they love personA or personB the most! I´m so sorry for the long wait in the previous chapter. Hopefully, I will be able to keep my pace this time. Hahaha, and no, Shizuo will not get broke, maybe... I hope you like this chapter and tell me your opinion about it soon!

**Guest:** I'm glad you think that this is the best mermaid AU, it really makes me happy. And I know the wait is long, I'm so sorry! I hope to be able to keep updating like this now!

**anonnym: **Thank you for your review! I'm glad this story caught your attention! And I'm so glad you like the cliffhangers! I try really hard to keep the story interesting :3 I hope you enjoy the next chappy!

**Chapter 6**

**Shizuo´s POV**

_I can't believe I'm doing this,_ I mentally groaned.

I have been standing in front of a store in the clothing district of the city for over half an hour now, deciding whether I should enter this one or not.

My head has been a mess ever since Izaya's proposal yesterday.

"…_would you show me what a festival is if I had legs?"_, the words were still stuck in my mind, as fresh as the moment after they were pronounced.

Izaya had explained me that he "kind of" knew about a spell that could grant legs to a siren in exchange for their voice. It was nothing permanent and, if he was careful enough, he could make it last an entire night. More than enough time to check what a festival was. Everything sounded like a flawless plan, until he reminded me that even with legs, he would still be as stark naked as he usually was.

Which brings me back to my current dilemma.

_Why do I keep spending my salary on his whims?,_ I asked myself, not sure if I wanted to hear the answer or if I had it at all.

The clothes on display looked good from afar, but when I got near them… I just couldn't picture Izaya in them. Some were too simple while others looked too pompous. I ran a hand through my hair. Here I was, losing my precious day off picking clothes for a bastard that had no way of paying me back, and I didn't even know where to begin.

I mean, I was the least qualified person to do something like this!

I was so relieved when I joined the militia. Half of my everyday clothes are provided by them, and the other half is provided by my little brother. Never in my life have I stopped myself to think much about my attire, just picking up whatever felt comfortable and clean, and now I was supposed to pick up an entire wardrobe?

My hands were itching so I quickly lighted a cigarette to try and calm my mind a little. This was (surprisingly) my first smoke in three weeks. A personal record, I must say. First breath in and I could already feel the numbing effects of the blessed nicotine. Good, now I could think straight again. This can't be that hard!

I was still burning holes through the glass of the shop when a familiar voice called me from behind.

"Shizuo! Fancy meeting you here!"

I turned around to see Shinra and Celty walking towards me from the other side of the street. It was a rare sight, seeing them without their medical garbs on.

"Yo, Shinra" I greeted them, stomping over my cigar "Celty" I bowed my head a little. I knew she didn't like the smoke.

"What are you doing here? Suddenly felt like satisfying your fashion needs, hmm?" Shinra asked, checking the front of the store I was still at.

"Nah, I'm not buying for me. Is for a…" _siren,_ "someone else…", I ended up saying. "What about you?", I tried to divert their attention from the topic.

"What? Is it not obvious?" Shinra asked, his body suddenly getting the consistence of noodles. "Me and my dearest here are in a lovey-dovey dat-Ughuh!" The rest of that sentence was promptly cut off by Celty's sharp jab at Shinra's plexus.

"**You're buying clothes for a friend? Need some help?**" Celty asked using sign language.

At least the militia school classes were useful for something.

"Is more like I don't even know where to begin searching..." I commented, scratching the back of my head, a little embarrassed at the confession.

"Why, Shizuo! You should have told us sooner! We will gladly help you with your little quest for clothes" Shinra said, suddenly recovered. "But we can't possibly purchase clothes standing here, can we?" The doctor grabbed me by the shoulders, pushing me to the door of the store.

Shinra was always like this, meddling into other people's business and then dragging them to his pace. Of course, if I had wanted to, I could very well stomp my feet on the ground and shake Shinra off, but Celty was right beside me, smiling as if asking me to forgive his antics. I just sighed and let myself be led by these two.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

We have spent an hour now looking for clothes. After entering the store I gave them a vague description of Izaya and we started looking around. Shinra was busy going through some of the racks in the back of the store while Celty and I were checking some coats and scarves. It was getting a little chilly at night, after all.

One of the coats being worn by a mannequin caught my attention. It was a long black trench coat with fur lining and several buttons on the front.

"Black, definitely", I mused absentmindedly. I imagined Izaya wearing that same coat and smiled, it didn't look half bad.

"**You seem happy**", she signaled, giving me a small smile.

I may not have mentioned this before, but Celty could be considered the person who I got along the best after Tom. She liked to hear me out and I would often do the same for her whenever we had free time. And the best of it all was that we didn't need to delve into the details. We would just hear each other and not ask names or anything the other didn't want to share.

"I don't know why, though", I responded her, picking some gloves that were in front of me. "I shouldn't be spending anymore on him".

She laughed silently at that.

"**So not only food, but now clothes as well**", she added, knowing perfectly well who I was purchasing this for, without really knowing anything.

I had decided to tell Celty about the situation a few nights ago, excluding a lot of information to the point that she only knew I was meeting this person constantly and giving them food.

"What can I say, he is high maintenance, that flea", I said, managing to sound pissed at the situation when I really wasn't. I put the gloves back on their place, but she grabbed them and threw them into the basket she was carrying.

"**These are on me**", she signaled the black gloves that I was checking before.

I was going to argue against that when a voice interrupted us.

"Hoho, what is going on here? Discussing some dirty secrets I shouldn't know about?", Shinra decided to join our conversation, using his usual annoying tone.

The doctor was well known because of his creepy and somewhat perverted nature, sometimes sputtering comments without an ounce of shame in that same voice.

"Shut up", I cut him off. I wasn't about to discuss that topic with him.

"Well, I guess we have a good amount of clothes by now", he announced, unaffected by my response. "On to the next store!"

I hesitantly followed the two, just hoping that whatever they picked up wouldn't damage my already endangered pocket.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

I was on my way to the cave after my round the following day. In my bag was one of my old shirts, since Izaya had told me that he would need something to start practicing how to walk.

The outfit that Celty and Shinra had helped me purchase was carefully wrapped in a paper bag in my room, waiting for the next festival to come up. Celty had insisted that since this was a gift, it should be properly wrapped up. And I wasn't so against the idea to actually stop her.

When I arrived at the entrance of the rift, I started to feel kinda anxious. I knew that half of my anxiousness was because I really wanted to see a human-like Izaya, and the other half was because I was also really afraid of seeing a human-like Izaya.

Over the past few days, I have come to a middle point with my feelings where I could openly admit that I found myself (more times than I would like to admit) thinking about how cute or beautiful Izaya was. I wasn't sure how or why these thoughts came to be (and I didn't want to know either), but I knew that they were there. And now, faced with the new idea of seeing him in a more normal yet unknown form… It was wrecking havoc on my mind.

I ran a hand over my hair, trying to get rid of some of the anxiousness before stepping into the rift. I was getting nowhere waiting over here anyways.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

"What took you so long?", was what welcomed me this time, along a pouty face from Izaya.

"Despite what you may think, I actually have responsibilities to take care of out there." I jokingly said, successfully avoiding to mention that I had been in front of the cave for fifteen minutes already.

"Hmph!" I heard him scoff along with a tiny murmur that sounded just like: _Do brutes even have responsibilities?_ I didn't comment on that. " Did you bring what I told you?"

Izaya was notoriously more irritating than normal, but his voice was intertwined with an excitement that I wasn't sure I had heard in him before. _The idea of getting out of this cave must be something he is really looking forward to, huh._

"Yeah, yeah. It's here", I said while waving the bag a little to show him.

Izaya seemed pleased with that. He eagerly jumped out of the water and landed gracefully in the shore beside the rock I usually sat at. I could tell just by looking that he was excited but also had a small reluctant air.

"Have you done this before?", I voiced my doubt.

"I never had a reason to", he explained, running a hand through the length of his tail. My eyes followed the movement, admiring the red-striped scales. "So, no. I've never done this", Izaya sounded oddly sincere.

_I'm not the only one anxious, it seems._

"Well, here goes nothing" Izaya whispered before closing his eyes.

He started to hum a song. The melody started small, so much that I had to strain my ears to be able to catch it in the beginning. Slowly, the tune gained strength and Izaya opened his mouth to add some odd words to the mix. I took me a minute to recognize the melody. It was the same one that I had heard in the beach back then.

My attention was drawn back to his tail when an eerie glow started to emanate from it. I shielded my eyes from the new source of light, taking a few steps towards him. The glow was growing brighter while his voice died down to a mere whisper. Finally, he stopped.

And I couldn't help the sharp intake of air when I looked again.

Where there were once scales, now it was skin. A pale extension of skin. I could feel how my jaw went weak while I was admiring the new limbs that Izaya had grown. He, on the other hand, had an odd expression, something mixed with awe and reluctance. Shyly, he moved his hands over his legs, touching his new skin and trying to move his toes a little. I took notice that his eyes were no longer the piercing glowing red that they used to, either.

My eyes roamed his whole body, and I was relieved to see that everything turned out fine. It wasn't until my gaze decided to wander a little off course that I remembered what the shirt was for.

I turned around somewhat flustered and took out the shirt that I have brought. Then quickly went over and handed it to him.

"Here, cover yourself", I dryly said, expecting for him to take the shirt and put it on. However, Izaya eyed the shirt with a raised brow before glaring at me. Even without words, I swore I could hear his voice in my head saying: _Are you an idiot?_ "Oh, right. Guess you don't know how…", I sighed. "Come on, lift your arms".

It was faster if I did it myself. Izaya looked surprised for a second, but did as I said. I crouched behind him and held the shirt open over his head, managing to get both hands on the sleeves before sliding the rest of the shirt down. Izaya's body build was thinner than mine, so his head went through without any struggle, but the shirt looked huge over his frame, and the sleeves were too long as well.

"Sorry, I know is not the best fit", I examined the length of the shirt. Well, at least it covers the necessary. "How does it feel?"

Izaya just kept admiring the intricate form of the shirt as if it was the most fascinating thing in the world. I felt a small smile tug at the corners of my mouth, finding the whole display endearing, but quickly coughed and tried to cover it with my hand.

"Right, you can't talk", this was going to be harder than I thought. "Nod once for good?"

Izaya finally turned to me, his face a bright pink as if he had been holding his breath for a long time now. Then he started laughing wholeheartedly. I watched him with surprise before understanding that the bastard had been mocking me. AGAIN.

"What was all that about losing your voice?!", I asked, angered and (albeit I would never admit it) embarrassed. Izaya never missed a chance to make fun of me.

"Haha… I never said I couldn't speak at all! You just assumed I wouldn't!", he exclaimed while holding his stomach, tears springing to his eyes.

It took a lot of self-control on my part not to smash him into the ground, all previous fuzzy feelings evaporating from my being.

"Besides…", he took a deep breath, removing some tears from the corner of his eyes. "I did lost my voice. Just not in the sense you were thinking"

I glared at him, daring him NOT to continue this time. He looked at me and grinned.

"I lost my voice as a siren", he wisely elaborated. He looked at his legs and drew them to his chest, placing his chin on his new knees "The voice of a siren is something very powerful and precious, but we can still exchange it for legs to visit you humans on land… Don't you think it's curious?", his voice was barely a whisper now. He slowly turned his head in my direction.

The soft gaze that accompanied his words made me aware that this was Izaya being sincere and finally opening up a little. I took a second to calm down before answering.

"What is so good about humans that you are willing to give up something like your voice to come here?" I asked the first thing that came to mind.

Izaya didn't answer immediately.

"Humans are very interesting…", he finally mumbled, absentmindedly. "And maybe sirens are just a bit too lonely", he turned his head to the pond, watching the dark waters as if they held the answers to unasked questions.

I followed his gaze, trying to decipher the meaning behind those words. I wanted to know what he meant by that, about sirens being lonely. But something in my mind told me that the more I knew about it, the less I would be able to return to my life before any of this started. I wouldn't **want **to return to it.

_I mean, we will go our separate ways one day, right? _

The suddenness of that thought pierced me like an ice spear.

"Nevermind", his voice had returned to normal. It was almost like the previous whispers had been just hallucinations. He turned back to me with his usual shit-eating grin.

It disappointed me, not being able to voice my thoughts anymore.I sighed, trying to bury that previous feeling as deep as possible.

"Here", I stood up and extended my arms to him. He looked at me, unsure, glancing back and forth between my hands and his legs. "Come on, I'll help you", I tried to reassure him.

Hesitantly, he took my hands, and I pulled him up with as much carefulness as I could muster. However, when he was upright and supposed to rely his weight on his legs, he simply didn't and ended up colliding against me instead. I held him by the shoulders, noticing how he wasn't able to stand by himself. Izaya darted his hands to my arms immediately, afraid of falling down. I smirked at this.

"Hehe, not as dangerous with four limbs, hmm flea?" I couldn't help the urge to tease him when he looked so damn vulnerable. The words earned me a glare and an attempt from his fingers to pierce my skin by sheer force. The poisonous and long claws no longer there, I noticed.

"If I ever find a way to give you a tail, we'll see who laughs then", he mumbled in a nasty tone, but he still didn't risk letting go of my arms.

I could feel my smirk growing soft. _This brat._

"Yes, yes, whatever you say", now that he was more or less on his feet, I could finally see that he was around one feet shorter than me. "Okay now, legs are different than a tail", to what he mumbled something similar to: _No shit, genius_. A vein popped in my head, but I kept talking. "Your weight has to be distributed between both legs. Here, separate your feet to match the distance between your shoulders", I explained, seeing how he seemed to keep both feet together. _Still thinking like a siren, huh?_

He was giving me and his legs a distrustful glare. I innocently smiled and used my own foot to push his feet to the sides, separating them forcefully.

"Be careful, you brute!", he screamed, holding my arms for dear life. _This is fun, _my mind decided.

"You wanna walk? Then do as I say", I exposed, effectively shutting his mouth. He looked as if he wanted to snap back, but decided against it. Maybe the fact that I was his only way to keep standing had something to do with it.

I spent the next half-hour or so trying to convey Izaya to understand the complicated physics involved in walking. It pains me to admit it, but Izaya was pretty intelligent and got the basics of it just fine. Not that I would praise him aloud.

After we got the theory down, I started to let go of him every few minutes to see if he had managed to find his balance. After a few times almost falling over his nose, he finally got to stand on his feet without my help. I was watching him take baby steps from a safe distance when another thought crossed my mind.

"How are you going to get your tail back?"

Izaya stopped to look at me, almost losing his balance in the process. I reached out to him, in case he actually fell but he managed to remain on his feet for once.

"Well, this spell does take my voice as an exchange for these things", he said, sending an annoyed glare to his feet. "The more I talk, the less it will last. I think that with the frequency that I'm doing it now, it will last a few hours. Three tops, maybe".

"Huh, so when we actually go to the festival…?" I wondered aloud, connecting two and two together.

"Correct. I will try to remain as silent as possible to make it last throughout the night", he explained, more focused on remain standing than in the actual conversation.

"A silent flea?", I imagined a silent Izaya. _No snarky comments to piss me off, huh_. "That sounds good. Why don't you remain like that?" I joked.

"Why, Shizu-chan, I thought that you enjoyed my lovely voice", he responded back. It shouldn't surprise me that he would still risk to piss me off even when a small push from me could very well cause a lot of damage. "Besides, we already know how good you are at dealing with a silent me, right?", Izaya added with a mocking grin.

"Tch, shut up", I mumbled, remembering how much he laughed at that.

"Oh, don't feel bad", he kept using that infuriatingly condescending tone that only promised trouble. "Many underdeveloped species can handle only one way of communication".

"You know, for a supposedly superior being, you really don't have any sense of danger, do you?", I warned, feeling the wolfish grin fall in place.

"Well, that is normally what happens when a more intelligent species face a dumber beast, Shi. Zu. Chan~"

There was only so much I could take of those comments. I couldn't care any less if the guy would be at a disadvantage because he had just learned how to stand straight, I threw my arm in his direction with only enough force to knock him to the other end of the cave.

Surprisingly enough, Izaya dodged the blow by moving to the side just in time. His reflexes took me by surprise, and judging by the disbelieving smile that he sent my way, he was surprised as well. Too bad that I was way too out of it at the moment to congratulate him for getting so good in such a short time.

As soon as the surprise faded, I threw a second punch to where Izaya was. This time, he managed to make a jump to the side to avoid it. I did stop this time, not only because I found such a feat to be amazing, but also because the flea had miscalculated the jump and landed right beside a sharp rock, quickly loosing his balance and falling over it.

The next movement was purely on instinct. My body moved as fast as it could and the next thing I knew was that I had Izaya tightly wrapped in my arms, both of us laying on the cave floor. I quickly checked his head to see if he had hit the rock but I couldn't find any blood nor wound. I sighed in relief, but the feeling didn't last long.

"What did you do now?", Izaya asked in a fake exhausted tone.

"It's your fault for provoking me!", I exclaimed in my defense.

I sat back up, and only when I removed my hands from his back did I notice that I had managed to smash the sharp rock to pieces during our fall. I looked at my hands and, as usual, found no scratch. _Guess rocks are just not hard enough._

Izaya examined my hand and then turned around to see the rock, or what was left of it.

"You really are a monster…", he whispered.

It wasn't like I haven't heard those same words before, but hearing them from him, who hasn't called me like that for weeks now, sent a small pang to my chest.

"Should I have let you split your head open then?", I couldn't hold the bitter tone.

Izaya turned his head back to me, surely catching the change in my voice and then laughed.

"Wouldn't that be a little troublesome to clean?", he responded, the mirth never leaving his voice, despite talking about his own death. "Besides, I never said being a monster was a bad thing...".

I couldn't even answer back, because right at that moment his legs started to glow and I had to cover my eyes once more. When the light had finally died down, Izaya's tail was back, along with the red glow of his eyes and the claws.

"It lasted a little less than three hours, huh…", he mused, making invisible calculations in his mind.

I was still thinking of what he had just said, but it didn't feel right to bring it up again. I let the comment slide and stood up completely.

"Need a hand?", I offered, noticing that we were a little too far from the pond for Izaya to just jump back.

"Only if you don't throw me to the other side of the cave", he conditioned, but he still grabbed my hand without any kind of doubt, despite his words.

"Don't make me wanna reconsider, flea", I jokingly warned, pulling him up and grabbing him by the waist while he naturally grabbed my neck.

Now that I thought about it, Izaya was kinda heavy with that tail. If I didn't have this monstrous strength, would I be able to carry him like this?

_Guess this strength is not so bad._

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

_OtPr: That´s all for today folks! Now, I must admit I was a little disappointed myself about how this chapter was coming up. It was just so boring! And long! I know you were expecting the festival... But I needed to develop Shizuo's relationship with Celty and Shinra... Thank goodness Naria helped me cut it down and make the pace a little less boring and I felt a little better with the final result! Still, the decision is really yours my lovely readers! Please let me know what you really think of this chapter and the pace the story is going. I tend to delve a little too much on the details and then I have a monster of over 6000 words in my hands that I hate myself xD I hope to read your reviews and feel free to tell me about anything you feel off! I will try to work on it, promise! Until next time!_


	7. Chapter 7

**Author´s note:** Thank you all who have been following my story! I know is kinda late, but this story was almost one year old the last time I updated, so I will use my AN this time to thank all of those who have kept up with me since the very beginning, and for all of those who just recently started, let's wish for steady updates this year! We start May with an update! Yeeeey! Thanks to Naria for beta-ing this and helping me come up with some ideas that, I assure you, you will like! Now, for the anons!

**ShiZayaUsUkSinJa (who signed as "Guest" but I know it's you): **Thank you for your lovely review! You really flatter me since I'm not that wonderful, but I'm glad you find my story amusing enough to think that of me! I really feel you when you say school is time consuming. I'm the same right now, between college, work and the story. But I manage to find time at work to keep writing. The last three chapters were wrote at my work, lol. Hope you like the new chapter too! (BTW, I'm kinda curious as of how you know when I update the story xD But if it's a secret, its a secret x3)

**Guest: **I'm glad you think this story is lovely! I'll try to update as soon as possible! But life sometimes is a bad friend that keeps you away for a while xD Enjoy the next chappy!

**Chapter 7**

**Shizuo´s POV**

"Do you need my help?", I couldn't help but ask after waiting outside of the cave for twenty minutes already.

"I can handle this by myself, impatient brute", Izaya answered back from inside, but judging by the tone he was using, the one who was getting impatient about the situation was him.

I smirked at that. _I'll give him another ten minutes. _

Weeks have gone by now and finally the Blue Moon Festival had arrived. It was a really big event since this festival only happened once every two or three years, when a calendar year would happen to have thirteen full moons instead of twelve. And such a rare astronomical phenomenon was quite popular at the moment, so the whole city was working extra hard this year. Or that's what I've heard from Tom and the citizens.

This was by no means my first Blue Moon Festival. I have attended quite a few since my childhood, most of them with my brother in tow. But considering who was accompanying me today, I had a feeling that this one would be interesting.

I stood up and dusted the sand from my pants, a little impatient myself. _I know I said ten minutes, but who cares?_

"The festival will be over by the time you're ready, flea!", I stormed to the entrance with all the intention to go and get Izaya, but right at that moment he stepped out of the rift.

His eyes immediately darted to the sky and the sea that we had right in front of us, and I could clearly see the happiness and relief wash over his face. How long has it been since he last saw the sea? How many months now?

_Of course he must have missed it._ Will he go back, now that he was out of that cave? My heart clenched at the thought.

I must have been making a weird face, because when I returned from my deep thinking, Izaya was looking at his clothes somewhat embarrassed.

"If I look weird, it's your fault", he commented, glancing the other way.

I blinked at that and then chuckled, he must have thought that my frown was because of his clothes.

"It's actually the opposite. If I didn't knew better, I would have thought you were human", I said truthfully, ruffling his hair a little to get rid of his insecurity.

And I meant that; Izaya looked even more human now with the clothes on. He was wearing the trench coat that I saw along with a pair of black slacks that Celty picked out. I scanned his outfit and I was proud to see that he had managed to tie his shoes properly and button down the coat by himself.

After he had mastered the art of walking (and running, and jumping around like a real damned flea), I had took it to myself to teach him the basics of human interactions. Not that I was an expert or anything, but there were some things that even I could teach him. And the result was now in front of me.

"Perfectly normal, except for those marks on the sides of your head", I added, running a finger over them.

I had actually never touched them before. I was surprised to find that they had a slippery feel to them, and that they were actually embossed on his face. Izaya flinched at the motion and I immediately retrieved my hand.

"Don't touch them!", he hissed, taking a step back and covering them with his hands. "They are not just marks, I use those to breath underwater"

"Sorry. I didn't know", I excused myself and then looked at them for a few seconds. _They are gills? _"You can say they are ugly tattoos", I proposed.

He sent another glare my way before sighing and letting it go. I smiled at that, the festival was more important than our daily bickering, it seemed.

"Shall we go?", I asked, already hearing the music starting to drift from the market plaza.

He only nodded, finally entering his silent mode. We started to walk to the port and he immediately latched himself to my right arm. I sent a look his way, trying to figure out the reason for that, but he was just looking everywhere but me. I urged myself to keep my eyes on the road ahead, trying to ignore the warmth that was threatening to set my face on fire.

oOoOoOoOoOo

We reached the entrance of the city and I could feel Izaya _vibrating _with excitement at my side. I would occasionally send a sidelong glance to my right just to see what kind of expression he was making. He was just like a little child experiencing a lot of things for the first time, and even though this festival was nothing new to me, I found myself smiling more often than not over the silliest of things. Even though Izaya had vowed not to speak, his expressions were more than enough to tell me where he wanted to go and what he wanted to do.

We spent the first hours of the festival just walking around the food stalls, trying some of the food or simply watching how they were made. It was mainly peaceful, only disrupted by the occasional tug on my arm to indicate me that Izaya wanted to go where his finger was pointing.

However, I did notice that whenever a stall seller got too close to us, Izaya would use me as some kind of shield and warily eye the seller. I guess that as much as he claimed that the humans were interesting and how much he wanted to come to the festival, he still seemed to be cautious around others. It reminded me of those first encounters I had with him...

"Shi. Zu. Oh!", a strident voice called me from somewhere behind, interrupting my thoughts.

I turned around and Izaya did the same with a curious expression. We spotted a large black man waving one of his arms in our direction. The man stood out like a sore thumb, not only because he was well over two heads taller than the rest of the crowd, but also because he had a big sign attached to his back that served as advertisement for his stall.

"Yo, Simon", I greeted, waving a hand when we got near him.

"Ah, Shizuoh, good to see you here", the man said with a relaxed smile, a gesture that seemed out of place with that giant wrestler body of his. "The festival is good for you. And you know what else is good for you?"

I didn't even need to think my answer for that, but it wasn't like Simon was going to let me voice it anyways.

"Sushi!", he answered himself, handing me a flyer that announced his stall at the festival and also had a fifteen percent off on a next purchase at his restaurant.

I had met Simon during my many trips to the market, searching for Izaya's tuna rolls. Kadota had seen me purchasing sushi at the other stand and recommended me Simon's restaurant in the commercial district. The man was a foreigner and a little on the nosy and eccentric side, but his prices were good and Izaya seemed to like the food there, so I quickly became a regular.

"Thanks Simon", I answered offhandedly, putting away the flyer in one of my pockets.

Izaya's curiosity had finally overpowered him and he got out from behind me to eye the sign over Simon's back, his eyes wide, recognizing the words of his favorite food.

"What is this?", Simon asked, crouching a little to get a better look at Izaya. The sudden movement set Izaya on alert and he immediately tensed. "You with a friend, Shizuoh?"

"Something like that", I mumbled, ignoring the fact that I didn't know what to call my relationship with Izaya. "This is Izaya, he is new to the city", I quickly explained, placing a reassuring hand on Izaya's shoulder.

"Nice to meet you! Shizuoh's friends are my friends!", Simon said with that broad smile. "Good for you, Shizuoh!", he suddenly added and I turned to him, confused. "Friendship is a beautiful thing. Friends are good for the soul", Simon had somehow gotten behind us and was now crushing us with his arms over our shoulders. "Do you know what else is good for the soul?"

"No, Simon. We really don't-", I tried to interrupt him, knowing very well where this was heading.

"Sushi!", the man completely ignored me. "Come, I give you good sushi. Sushi good for the heart", he had started to push us in the direction of his stall, and all of a sudden, the man didn't know how to properly speak english anymore. "The heart is very important, like love", he kept on mumbling incoherences that I had tried to decipher before, but now just let them fall on deaf ears. "Sushi very good for love, too"

I turned a little to see what face Izaya was making over this, but I found that he looked rather eager by the idea of getting some of his beloved sushi, his previous cautiousness gone from his face. I sighed and let myself be pushed by Simon.

oOoOoOoOoOo

"Here you go. A serving for two!", Simon exclaimed, putting a varied selection of sushi rolls before us.

"Simon, I don't-"

"Oh no, no, no", he said, waving his hands in front of me. "You never say no to sushi. Sushi good", he added as if that explained everything. "Sushi good for love, too", I remembered he said something similar on our way here.

I looked up to the black man and saw that he was clearly sending us a meaningful smile this time. I frowned, successfully controlling the blood rushing to my face.

"We're not like that", I scoffed, looking over my shoulder to where Izaya was, but he was way too absorbed by the sushi in front of him to be paying us any attention.

"Sushi good for any kind of love", Simon stated, finally getting away from us to continue with his self-advertisement.

I rubbed my temple, turning to face Izaya. He was happily munching on his favorite tuna roll, but I could clearly see that there were other rolls already missing from the plate. The image calmed me and I rested my chin on one of my hands.

"Is it really that good?", I asked, seeing how he was practically _glowing _while devouring the tuna.

He turned my way, as if noticing me just now, and nodded eagerly. Then he looked back to the plate and shoved it to me. _Want some?_, my mind did the translation.

"No thanks", I quickly declined, shaking my head.

He propped a brow at that. _Why?_

"I don't like sushi. Or raw meats in general", I answered the silent question. But the interrogation mark didn't disappear from his face after that, so I continued. "I have more of a sweet tooth".

He looked surprised for a second before his grin returned to his face along with the mocking eyes. _So childish~, _I swear I could hear his voice on my head.

"Tch, don't laugh", I muttered, as if the other had really spoken. "You done? We have much festival yet to cover", I reminded him, getting up from the table.

Izaya huffed and quickly stuffed his mouth with the rest of the roll before running after me. I bid Simon goodbye and was glad to see that Izaya had relaxed enough to even wave a hand at Simon while we were walking off.

oOoOoOoOoOo

After the short (and forced) break, Izaya seemed to have relaxed around the other humans as well. He even had gotten near one of those one-man-band by himself to try and figure out how they were handling so many instruments at once. It was quite amusing, seeing all the kids surrounding the guy, and then the grown up that was Izaya watching with the same illusion as the children. After he was satisfied with that, we went to the game stalls.

The festival was divided between the food court and the entertainment plaza, where the game stalls were set up, along with some stalls with puppet plays for the children and some others playing music for the collective dance taking place at the center of it all. All in all, it was quite the show everybody was making; be it the kids running after each other or people laughing, drinking and dancing, it looked like the festival was a success.

While admiring the show taking place in front of me, I had lost sight of Izaya. When I turned again to look for him, I found him with his head ducked in one of those water barrels where you have to fish apples out of with your mouth. Some children were already surrounding him, admiring how he could hold his breath for that long and I had to refrain the impulse to smack my head before grabbing him by the hood of the coat, pulling him out. Izaya looked surprised for a second before recognizing me and giving me a innocent (and fake) smile.

"What are you playing at-?!", I was about to try and smack some sense into his flea-sized brain when someone tapped my shoulder.

I turned around to check who it was while Izaya could only crook his neck to the side to see.

"Yo, Shizuo", it was Tom.

"Tom", I greeted back, quickly releasing the flea.

"I'm glad to see that you decided to join us", he sent a glance to Izaya's disheveled appearance. "I… hope you're not causing problems", Tom added, sending an apologetic smile to Izaya.

"If anyone is causing trouble here, it's this flea", I remarked, pointing at Izaya.

He frowned and, since he couldn't speak, opted for sticking out his tongue.

"And who might he be?", Tom asked with a smile, curious at the interaction.

"Oh right. Tom, this is Izaya; Izaya, this is my superior I've talked to you about", I introduced them.

"Tom Tanaka, nice meeting you", Tom stretched a hand at Izaya and the other shaked it firmly this time, his hair starting to stick to the sides of his face.

I took notice of Izaya's wet hair and got a towel from the apple stand, putting it on his head to dry it. Izaya tried to resist me at the beginning, but was quickly overpowered by my relentless ruffling. When I removed the towel, he was glaring at me, but with his hair standing out in all directions, the glare had a rather funny effect instead. I snorted at his attempt to kill me with his eyes, which only made him try even harder.

Tom laughed at that moment, drawing our attention again.

"I was worried that you may be feeling lonely at the festival, but I see that I had nothing to worry about", he said, looking at us with an oddly satisfied smile. "Well, I'll leave you two to your things", he said, starting to walk off in the direction of the collective dance, where a woman was already waiting for him. "See ya"

I watched Tom go, a little confused at his words, but Izaya simply waved a hand at the retreating man with a smile of his own.

"Oh, by the way", Tom added, looking over his shoulder. "I saw Vorona looking for you before", he looked at Izaya briefly before continuing. "You should avoid the food stalls for a while", he finished, turning away again.

I had no idea how those two statements related to each other. I turned to look at Izaya to see if he had somehow understood what Tom meant, but he was actually frowning at Tom, as if something had upset him.

"What's wrong?"

He turned to me with the same upset expression and opened his mouth, as if he was actually going to speak this time, but suddenly looked unsure about something and sighed, closing his mouth again. He shaked his head and smiled at me.

The parade of expressions confused me, but I decided against asking anymore, even though I could tell that his smile just now was a _fake_.

oOoOoOoOoOo

It was already late and we had almost finished visiting every game stall in the plaza. The whole tour had been quite fun, watching Izaya fail miserably at most of the games, and making sure that I didn't miss any chance to rub it on his face.

The only game that was left was the famous throwing knives course, which we were nearing now. That game was pretty popular, for some reason, so there was a moderate crowd surrounding the course and putting some extra pressure on the participants. I sent a daring glance at Izaya and he immediately catched it, putting his prideful smile on and stepping right on the middle of the course, barely hearing the instructions from the clerk.

However, the flea turned out to be really good at throwing knives. He started hitting the targets with a precision that bordered on scary, getting the attention of those already around us and some more that were nearby. When he was (finally) out of knives and targets, he turned around just to receive a round of applause and cheers from all the people that had gathered to see him.

The crowd of people intimidated him, but his expression quickly softened seeing how all these people were actually congratulating him and giving him friendly punches and hugs, some even ruffling his hair. I moved away a bit, to try and see the whole scene. He definitely looked like he belonged there, surrounded by other humans and laughing with them. I couldn't help the smile that took over my face.

When he received his prize, some kind of knife that could fold over, he turned around to look for me. From where I was I could clearly see the panic that momentarily crossed his face before his sight fell on me and he quickly moved to where I was, gracefully dodging the people that were on his way like he was swimming.

"I hope you were not thinking of me while throwing those knives", I spoke up when he was within hearing range.

He feigned surprise at the comment before putting a hand to his chest, as if I had offended him with it. _How could you think that?_, his voice played in my mind.

"Because I know you", I smiled at that. _Didn't I?_

He froze for a moment, as if the words had really taken him by surprise. He then raised his head to look at me for a second before smiling a real smile, that got me by surprise in return. Izaya then grabbed my wrist and started to walk in front of me and into the backstreets, and since the alley was a little narrow, I was not able to see his face until we got out.

oOoOoOoOoOo

We had arrived to a place of the city that was not so far from the festival, but was currently empty due to everybody still enjoying the celebration. It wasn't as illuminated as the plaza either, but thanks to the full moon, it was pretty clear out.

Izaya led me to one of the lonely benches that were facing the ocean and we sat down, admiring it for a while.

Suddenly, one of the clouds that were over the moon moved, giving way for the moonlight to fall on the waves, which resulted in a sparkling effect. I heard Izaya gasp at my side, and I turned my head to see him. His eyes were amazed by the ocean and his cheeks and nose were pink, most likely because the night air was chilly. Still, I found myself mesmerized once more.

"Beautiful…", the thought that usually remained a thought, decided to make its way through my mouth before I could stop it.

Izaya immediately turned to look at me, surprised and it could be just wishful thinking from my part, but he looked a little more pink than before. I quickly ransacked my head for an excuse, feeling how his eyes were boring on mine.

"The ocean", I said, looking right in front of me.

I watched him from the corner of my eye, but he remained like that for a while before he relaxed a smile, suddenly scurrying his arms around my right arm and resting his head on that shoulder, facing the sea.

"Yes, very beautiful", he said in a whisper, finally speaking after so long.

I almost jumped at that, suddenly faced by the reality when he spoke. I took a deep breath and relaxed, but when I dropped my gaze again, I catched a glimpse of this forlorn expression on his face.

"Do you miss it?", I asked, watching him intently.

"What?", he turned to me with a unknowing smile.

"The ocean", I felt his grip on my arm tighten slightly. Or maybe it would have been enough to harm any other person, but not me.

"A little", he answered looking at the sea again, his voice barely audible, but still there.

I was expecting that answer, but actually hearing it squeezed my chest uncomfortably. I took a deep breath before continuing.

"Will you go back?", I managed to get out.

"I can't", he said after a while, straightening up and letting go of my arm. I was about to ask him what he meant by that, but he continued on his own. "There is something I lost, and I need to get it back. Otherwise, I will never be able to leave this shore".

"You lost something?", that was new. "What is it?"

"My soul", he answered, his gaze looked very far away.

The answer left me dumbfounded. He turned to look at me and noticed the confusion in my face, chuckling at whatever expression I was making.

"Ah, I guess it would be kind of difficult for a human to understand", he sent me a somewhat sympathetic stare. "Sirens are very different from humans", he said slowly, like you would to a child. "Unlike you, who have very short lifespans, we can live a few hundred years. Because of that, I guess, you humans have ethereal souls that are one with your bodies, while ours are condensed and we carry them around, in the form of a pearl"

"...and you lost yours?", was the only thing I could think.

"You could say it was stolen from me", he said bitterly.

"How...?"

"I may have made someone mad out there…", he responded vaguely, shrugging it off as if it was nothing.

The information that was finally being provided to me was overwhelming my mind. I was having a hard time grasping the meaning of Izaya's words. He had lost his soul? Was that _even _possible? And who did he made mad enough to steal his _soul_?

"Don't you, like, need your soul?", from my understanding, souls were actually pretty vital, weren't they?

He looked at me, incredulous.

"Are you stupid? Of course I do!", he exclaimed with a laugh. "If my soul gets to far from me, and I die…", he lowered his tone. "If a siren dies away from his soul, they will turn into sea foam", he said this as if it were part of a children's lullaby. A creepy lullaby.

"And you are sure that it is in Sagena?"

"I can feel it", he lifted his eyes to the night sky. " I can't pinpoint where it is exactly, but I know it's here"

A silence settled in.

"And you will go back?", I insisted. "Once you get your soul?"

"Maybe…", he turned to look around us. "Humans are so much fun, though", he muttered with a weird smile.

"Can't you stay?", I quickly added, not even sure of what I meant myself. He looked directly into my eyes and scanned them as usual.

At some point of the conversation, we had closed up the distance between us (or maybe there was none since the beginning), and the once loud voices were now mere whispers that nobody would have been able to hear unless they were us.

"What? Will you miss me if I leave?", he asked back in a joking tone, a smile accordingly decorating his face.

"Maybe…", I whispered, raising a hand to his cheek.

Izaya seemed taken aback by my answer and the sudden caress, but otherwise didn't make a move to remove my hand.

"Shizu-chan…", this time, that irritating nickname sounded so _intimate_. He raised a hand and put it over the one already covering his cheek.

The heat radiating from the flea's hand added to the one I was already getting from his blushing cheek gave me some kind of confidence that I was lacking before and I moved my lips to Izaya's slightly opened ones, but I stopped before going all the way. I didn't want to do something that was not mutually agreed, so I waited for Izaya to make the final push if that was what he wanted. My heart almost stopped when I noticed Izaya moving in to meet my kiss...

But just before contact, as if by some whim from a higher being, a sudden light engulfed Izaya's lower half. I quickly removed my hand from his face to shield my eyes from the glow that had so rudely interrupted us. After a minute, the light disappeared, only leaving behind a surprised Izaya with a pair of wide glowing eyes and a torn pair of black slacks, his tail sticking out from what used to be one of the legs of the pants.

_Such timing…_

"I guess we abused the amount of words...", I commented, the disappointment dripping in my voice.

He threw me a condescending smile, removing the ragged slacks and throwing them away.

"It lasted five hours, huh?", he mumbled to himself, taking mental notes once more.

When Izaya's tail was free again, I quickly took off my own jacket and wrapped it around the slippery limb, trying my best to cover it up so that no one would see it on our way back to the beach. We had mistakenly gotten too far from the cave and now we would have to be extra careful so that no one would notice us.

Once the tail was completely covered, I picked up Izaya from the bench. As usual, his hands laced behind my neck, bringing our faces close to each other. Our eyes immediately met, the feeling from the previous situation still fresh on our minds. We stared at each other for a little more than necessary before the sound of a nearby tripping drunkard snapped us back. Izaya intelligently went for the hood of the trench coat (that was thankfully still intact) and covered his face, concealing his glowing eyes, and after that I started to walk back to the alleys.

oOoOoOoOoOo

"And?", I said after a while of walking. "Did you imagine that the festival would be anything like this?", I asked, half out of curiosity and the other half just to initiate a conversation.

We had walked past the market plaza and were now almost out of the city. Luckily, the festival was nearing its end and those who were still awake had gathered at the entertainment plaza for the grand finale, making it easy to travel the alleys without having any unpleasant encounter.

"No", he finally answered back after a short silence. "It was much more fun than I thought it would be", I couldn't see his face, but I could hear the smile in his voice. "Thanks", this part was muffled and almost unintelligible, but Izaya was so close to me that I could even make out his breathing over the rest of the night sounds.

I took a deep breath and continued walking towards the port, feeling how Izaya decided to rest his head on the crook of my neck, his breath calm. _He must be exhausted, _I thought while watching him. So many things could have gone wrong, but I was glad we had carried this out. I liked to think it had helped us, in more ways than one.

"Superior Shizuo, is that you?", I froze in midstep, feeling how Izaya's breath hitched at the sudden voice.

_Crap,_ was the only thing I could think of.

oOoOoOoOoOo

_OtPr: We are done! I must say I enjoyed writing this chapter. I specially enjoyed writing Simon xD He's one of my favs character in the series, but he doesn't get as much spotlight as I would like, but that's part of his charm too! The things are going to get hot soon enough, and I hope you keep liking it! What did you think of Izaya's "lost thing", hmm? I used several references from the real world as well as part of the original story of The little mermaid, if you want to check it out ;3 Read you soon!_


	8. Chapter 8

**Author´s note:** OH MY GOSH! You guys beat the record for the past chapter! Sixteen awesome and lovely reviews!? I could CRY! I can't believe so many people like this. Hahaha, I just hope I don't disappoint you! Today's chapter is once more brought to you thanks to my fabulous beta and of course, the encouragement you provide me with your reviews/follows/favorites. It really push me to continue this! You guys ROCK! There is a special something in this chapter for all of you, so I hope you like it!

**dara: **Ohohoho! You will have to wait and see! And thanks for the love, I love you all my lovely readers!

**Guest: **You really think this story is amazing? QwQ Thank you so much! I hope you like the next chapter!

**Chapter 8**

**Shizuo´s POV**

"It is you, correct?", I turned my head slowly to confirm that I was right.

"Vorona?", I responded back, incredulous at the bad luck. Izaya cursed under his breath, tensing all over and trying his best to keep his face hidden.

"Superior, I have been searching for you. I thought that you would not mind if we attended to the fireworks show toge-", she had kept on talking while approaching us, but suddenly halted when she noticed the suspicious cargo in my hands. "Is that a person?"

I mentally groaned, feeling how Izaya had tightened his grip on my neck at the question. I slowly turned around, checking that his face and tail were completely covered before doing so. And I was glad I did, since the first thing Vorona did was scan Izaya's body.

"He's, uh, not feeling well", I lamely tried to explain. "I'm taking him home", I wished with all my might that Vorona would just drop the subject like that.

"Do you need my help?", she offered, getting closer yet again.

"No!", I quickly bit my tongue, not meaning to raise my voice like that. "There is no need for that, I can handle this", I said, trying to cover it up.

"Nonsense, this kind of task clearly requires at least two people to be carried out without setbacks", she said nonchalantly, unaffected by my previous rejection.

Vorona was practically in front of us now and I had run out of valid excuses to threw at her. I could always just turn around and run, but that would make everything look even more suspicious. The closer she got the more I could feel my heart racing as the thought of Izaya being exposed to others and what would happen to him darted through my mind.

That's when Izaya decided to interfere.

He lifted his head, turning to Vorona. The sudden action took her by surprise, surely not expecting that the other person was actually conscious. Then, in a swift movement that I couldn't have stopped even if I wanted to, Izaya removed his hood, revealing a pair of ruby glowing eyes.

"Wha-?", she exclaimed, her eyes growing wide with disbelief and _fear_.

"You didn't see us today", Izaya said, using an unusual cold tone that sent a shiver down my spine, his grip on my neck telling me that he was actually tense. "Go back and continue with your night", he commanded, putting a hand on my chest to steady himself.

I was staring at Izaya and sweating bullets at the scene. Will it work? If anything, he had revealed himself to Vorona and she had clearly discovered that he was a siren, so if it didn't, we were done for.

However, the previous fear-stricken expression on Vorona's face had softened to her everyday one and her previously wide eyes were now normal and lackluster. Once Izaya had finished his order, she slowly nodded and turned around, walking away without further ado.

Watching her go just like that was unnerving and oddly relieving. Vorona was just about to discover everything- No, scratch that, she HAD discovered everything, and Izaya had just manipulated her into forgetting it all and leave? _A siren's voice is something very powerful, all right._ I was marveling at the display, but right at that moment Izaya tugged at my hair, bringing me back to the current issue.

"What are you waiting for, protozoan?", Izaya asked, irritation and a little of apprehension seeping in his voice. "For somebody else to find us?"

I sent him a silent glare as the idea of dropping him right then and there crossed my mind, but I shook my head and discarded it before continuing the walk towards the cave.

oOoOoOoOoOo

"Is she going to be okay?", I finally asked after we had reached the cave.

Izaya was sitting in a stone by the pond, unbuttoning his trench coat. He stopped at my question and turned to look at me, a frown on his face.

"What?"

"Vorona, is she going to be okay after that?", I explained.

He kept looking at me with that same scowl for a few seconds before turning away, returning to his unbuttoning.

"I fail to understand how your brain works to make you worry about her rather than us", he mumbled, a little irritated. "But yeah, she should be fine. She could have a little disorientation when she snaps out of it, but hopefully she will not remember our encounter", he finally removed the coat and threw it at me.

Once Izaya was free of the coat, he quickly removed the undergarments and jumped to the water, only to return to the surface once he had hydrated himself again. I picked up the clothes and put them into Izaya's own rucksack before sitting down, diving my naked feet in the water. It was cold.

"What do you mean 'hopefully'?", I continued after getting over the chill that the water gave me. "Didn't you order her to forget that she saw us?"

He looked at me for a second and then sighed, swimming near me and resting his head and arms on one of my knees.

"As much as I would like you to believe the contrary, you are better off knowing. A siren's voice is not something absolute", he started. "Sure, most of the time we can command those that hear us to do almost anything, but it really depends on the mentality of each prey", Izaya smiled sadistically at the word. "The weaker of mind the prey is, the easier to control it. And no matter how much I would like to assure you that I have never met another living being that surpasses my mental capabilities, I was not at my best today. And that friend of yours was not a dumb girl", he concluded, still frowning. "Even though she looked like one", he mumbled, the irritation returning to his tone.

"So you're saying that she may remember?", I asked, wisely ignoring the last comment.

"There is a small chance that she will reject my orders and remember what happened, yeah", he simplified.

We remained in silence for a while, letting the weight of those words sink in. I clenched my teeth, a little frustrated that we had almost gotten away with this without any negative consequences, just to be miserably discovered at the end.

"Why did you showed her your face?", I asked when I remembered that.

"The siren's command only works when you look directly into it's eyes. That's why they glow, to attract the eye of others", he mumbled.

Izaya was unusually talkative today. Well, not like he wasn't talkative all the time, but he wasn't evading my questions like always. Was he so tired that he had dropped his defenses, or was this his way of thanking me for taking him to the festival? Either way, I wasn't about to complain.

"There are a lot more rules to this power than I thought", I mused, noticing that my hand had subconsciously moved to Izaya's hair.

I started to gently rub his head, and Izaya closed his eyes at the motion. For just a second I waited for a purr-like sound to come out of his throat. Of course that didn't happen. I chuckled at my own thought before returning my attention to Izaya. It may have taken me awhile to realize it at first, but this creature in front of me was quite majestic. He may be an annoying bastard whenever he spoke, but the things he could do and the grace surrounding his actions were another thing altogether.

Then I tried to imagine what would happen if he was gone, if his presence in the city was made public and the city united against him. It was difficult, since I have never witnessed what the citizens would do in such a case, but just thinking of their rejection whenever they heard the word 'siren' gave me a pretty good idea of how they would react.

_I need to protect him. _

"Don't strain your brain, Shizu-chan", his voice snapped me back to the cave.

"What?", I asked, thinking that I may have lost some part of the statement.

"You're making the weird face you do when you think too hard", Izaya explained, his eyes now open and looking at me. "You'll give yourself a brain stroke", he explained, closing his eyes again. "What were you thinking?"

I contemplated the question for a while before shaking my head a bit. Worrying over this would not help at all.

"You know, you should go out to town even if it's not a festival", I suggested offhandedly, to which Izaya immediately perked up.

"Are you saying that I should go to town on my own?", he lifted his head, removing my hand in the process.

"I mean, you need to look for your soul, right? And what I saw today was that nobody suspected anything about you, so it should be safe to go to town and ask around", I explained. "I'll try to search for it during my rounds and within the base, but you're the one who can feel it. We may have a better chance of finding it if we look for it together, right?"

He looked at me for a second before chuckling.

"You know I can't actually ask around without speaking", he explained, amused that I had forgotten such an obvious fact. "Besides, shouldn't we focus on being more careful now that we risk being discovered by that girl?".

"Oh, right…", I thought about it for a second. "I'll keep an eye on her at the base", that sounded like a reasonable plan to me.

However, the frown Izaya gave me made me notice that he didn't think the same.

"I'm not sure I want you too close to that blond, though", he mumbled, looking the other way.

"Why?", I raised a brow.

"Because she has feelings for you", he said in a serious tone, turning to look directly into my eyes.

I kept his stare for a while before smiling incredulously.

"That's not true", I responded, trying to make Izaya drop the serious act.

He didn't.

"Are you seriously dumb? Or just when it's convenient?", he mused, tilting his head to the side.

I felt the familiar feeling of my blood starting to boil, but damn, today had been a fucking long day. I didn't even had that much energy left to get mad at him anymore. I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose to calm down and laying down on my side, getting my feet out of the water.

"Look, trust me on this one, I've known Vorona for far longer than you have. We've been together since the militia academy, so...", I looked at him directly, now that we were on the same eye level, trying to convey my logic to him. Of course that he didn't listen to me.

"That's exactly the problem. It may not be obvious to you, for whatever reason", he interrupted me, stressing the last part. "But other people can notice", I sighed, giving up on trying to convince him and laying down on my back.

"Other people being…?", Izaya noticed that I was trying to avoid this conversation, so he got out of the water and leaned over my head to keep the eye contact.

"Your friend Tom seemed to know...", he responded, and in the position we were in now, it wasn't long before the water drops from Izaya's body started to drip over me.

"How does Tom fit in anything…?", I dropped that thought. It was useless to continue discussing this. "Listen... We have to keep an eye on Vorona, and like it or not, I'm the only one who can do that. Besides, even if what you're saying is true, is not like it matters", at this I decided to raise a hand to his cheek, getting rid of some of the drops of water that clung to his face.

That gesture seemed to have the desired effect. Izaya looked at me for a complete second before finally dropping the scowl and relaxing his shoulders a bit. I smiled at his defeated posture, an accomplished feeling coursing through me.

"You have to trust me a little more", I whispered, running my thumb over his cheekbone.

He lowered himself even more, to the point where his chest rested completely against mine. His hands ventured to the sides of my head and I noticed that I was suddenly warm.

"I trust you more than you give me credit for", he whispered, his voice suddenly low and eyes directly into mine. "If this were anybody else, they would be long _dead_"

Call me sick, but the way he stressed that last word sent a pleasant wave through my body. I thrusted my head to meet his lips, not having enough self restraint to wait for Izaya's opinion this time around.

I was gladly met with his welcoming lips midway, though.

The contact started rough, thirsty. Teeth clacking against teeth since we were not familiar with the other yet, but that didn't deterred our need to get to know each other's every nook and cranny. His lips were wet and soft against my chapped ones, small and surprised gasps and breaths accompanying every move. My hands quickly found their way to Izaya's waist when I felt him tangle his fingers in my hair, electricity running through my nerves whenever our bodies met.

His constantly gasping lips granted me access to his mouth and we immediately started a fight for dominance. The struggle ended in my victory when I found one of Izaya's sweet spots right on the roof of his mouth, earning me a few muffled moans whenever I teased it. I smirked at that, and Izaya quickly bit down my lower lip in revenge but far from painful, the feeling of his bite was rather _pleasurable_.

It was only fair I returned the favor.

I took hold of his lower lip between my lips and sucked on it _hard_. Izaya sharply gasped at this, his grip on my hair tightening as his whole body trembled. With so much of a push to the side, I was able to exchange our positions. Izaya latched his arms around my neck and down my back to keep the distance between us (or lack thereof) while I used one of my forearms to support us both, the other hand busily roaming down Izaya's side as I subconsciously took notice of how perfectly my palm fit on the small of his back.

The feeling of Izaya squirming beneath me was exhilarating and everything seemed to be getting hotter, but I bet the lack of oxygen during all the exchange had something to do as well. We finally separated with a gasp, trying to get in as much oxygen as we could in one breath.

I opened my eyes, that had closed at some point, only to be greeted by a blushing and out of breath flea. He had also closed his eyes, but he slowly opened them to look at me. Half lidded and clouded irises greeted me while his chest heaved each breath he took. My throat automatically constricted, making me gulp.

"I…", I coughed at my raspy voice. "I have to go now", I couldn't trust myself at the moment to keep my cool for much longer.

Izaya only nodded, releasing my neck and letting both arms fall limply on each side of his head before covering his eyes with his forearms. I stood up and took in the rest of his body, noticing how his fins seemed to twitch with the aftermath of the kiss.

_I have to get out of here, _I thought, after feeling a familiar jolt go south.

"Well, get some rest. It was a long night", I said after I got over my reverie. I awkwardly bid goodbye, picking up my shoes and rushing for the exit. "Good night."

"Shizu-chan", he called me.

I slowly turned my head over my shoulder. Izaya was still in the same position, with his head slightly turned to me.

"See you tomorrow"

I nodded reassuringly and finally got out of the cave.

It was still cold outside but the cool night breeze that stung my reddened face was welcomed.

oOoOoOoOoOo

Tom and I were finishing our round at the port the next day. Everything was unusually quiet for a market morning in Sagena, but it wasn't like I was about to complain. Most people were surely still resting after yesterday's festival, after all.

We had been walking around the few stalls that were still in place when Tom had decided to tell me all about the lady that he met yesterday at the collective dance. I let him ramble on while my own mind slipped back to yesterday's events. Everything had turned out great and, without taking into account Vorona's incident, I could even say the whole plan had been flawless. I even got to know Izaya a lot better and we even-

"What about you, Shizuo? Anything mention worthy?"

I almost choked on air. _Can he read minds now?_

"Me? Erm, well-Oof!", just at that moment, something collided directly in my chest, making me lose my breath. The impact made me step back a bit, sending my hands to grab whatever had hit me.

My eyes immediately catched the fur lining of a familiar black trench coat and I knew that it was not something but rather _someone_.

"Flea?", I half breathed, half wondered out loud.

The person hugging me raised his head to reveal the mischievous smile of Izaya.

"What are you-?!", I loudly whispered.

"Are you okay?", Tom asked us, interrupting my question.

I quickly turned around to Tom, remembering where I was. Then I returned my eyes to Izaya before finally reaching the best course of action.

"Tom, can you give me a minute?", I said, grabbing Izaya by the hood of the coat and dragging him into the nearest and emptiest alley.

"Ah, sure…?", Tom answered back, watching us go.

oOoOoOoOoOo

"What the hell are you doing here!?", I finally asked once we reached an empty alley.

Izaya shook off my hand, straightening his coat with an offended huff.

"What, you say. You were the one who suggested I should go to town and ask about my pearl", he answered matter-of-factly. "And if I had known you would react like this, I wouldn't have run at you", he mumbled, but I could distinguish a bitter undertone in his voice.

That sent a small pang of guilt to my chest.

"Sorry, is not that…", I mumbled an apology. "You're asking around? Alone?", the thought of Izaya suddenly transforming in the middle of the plaza unsettled me. "That's too risky. What if you transform and somebody sees you?"

Izaya examined my eyes for a second, seemingly satisfied at what he saw.

"I'm not dumb, Shizu-chan. Not like someone I know", I let the comment slide this one time. "I'm using this", he said, suddenly pulling up a piece of paper from one of his pockets.

I took the paper and examined it. There was a drawing of an earring on it and the words "Seen it?" drawn along in black charcoal lines. The earring looked like a small auger shell with a pearl attached to the wider end of it. _So this is his pearl..._

"You drew this?", I asked, extending the paper to him.

He propped a brow at that as if saying _Who else?_, before taking the paper back.

"Besides, I'm not defenseless", he added before pulling out the knife that was given to him as a prize yesterday and unfolding it with a swift movement, pointing it at me.

"You're more resourceful than I thought", I praised him, not so sure if I should feel happy or not about Izaya not really needing me anymore. "And how long have you been like this?", I motioned to his legs.

"Around half an hour or so", he answered after looking at the sun, checking for the time.

"I'm almost done for the day. Stay close and then I'll help you look around for the remainder of the time", I offered, turning to the exit of the alley.

Izaya didn't answer, but he followed close behind.

oOoOoOoOoOo

My round was coming to an end and Izaya had (for once) listened to me and remained close while asking the citizens around with his drawing. From what I could tell, he had only received apologetic smiles and slow shakes of the head, none seemingly interested in asking the mute guy why he was searching for an earring in the first place.

When I was done with the port surveillance I walked back to town, bidding Tom goodbye and then looking for Izaya. I found him surrounded by some women that seemed to have recognized him from yesterday's performance at the Knife Throwing Course. He was silently laughing with them when he noticed me, waving an arm my way before parting from the group.

"Take care now, Izaya boy!", the women waved her arms to him.

I arched a brow at that and turned to look at Izaya, who was smiling brightly beside me.

"How did they know your name?" _And what was that 'Izaya boy'?_

Izaya turned to me before pulling up his drawing again, now showing me the backside where his name was written.

"You think of everything, huh?", I was still amused at how well he had habituated to deal with humans when just yesterday he was still tense around them.

He smiled proudly at my comment before we set ourselves to start the search.

We searched high and low around the market plaza and when we were done we moved to the commercial district where the bigger stores were. We searched in the jewelry stores, in hopes that the earring could have been in one of them, but we still found no leads as to where the pearl could be.

We were nearing the three hours time limit and, even though Izaya claimed that he hasn't spoken that much, being in a place that was so crowded was getting me anxious so I suggested that we started to move towards the cave. Izaya didn't seem very happy about it at first but complied anyways. I guess the idea of being captured again wasn't that attractive to him. _Now that I think about it…_

"How did you get caught that first time?", I asked him when we reached the entrance of the cave.

Izaya always evaded that question, but after all the information he gave me yesterday, I had the feeling that this time would be different.

He looked at me for a second before sighing and sitting in the sand by the entrance. I did the same, seating beside him.

"You never give up, do you?", he said, looking at me before finally answering me. "The essence of my pearl had led me all the way to this beach", he started, turning towards the sea. "I remained near the shore for a few days, studying the humans and hiding to not get discovered, trying to find where my pearl could have gone to. It was fun…", he mumbled this part with a small smile. "Unfortunately, I started to drop my guard the more I observed the humans and, one night, it seems that one of the fishers noticed me and gave notice to the guard", his smile turned bitter. "The chase extended until very early in the morning and I ended up trapped in one of their nets", he turned to look at me with that fake smile.

"And what did… they do?", I asked cautiously.

"... They seemed bent on capturing me and bringing me to land", he mused. "Of course, everything went awry once I started to fight back when we reached the shore", his hand softly touched his left hip, and I remembered the wound he had there when I met him. "When I started to thrash around and scratch them, they turned to their weapons… And I turned to mine", his stare was very far away, the scenes surely replaying in his mind eye. "You know how it ended", he turned to look at me, no trace of his usual smile on his face.

I remained in silence for awhile, taking in all the information.

"But... ", I just couldn't help the feeling that something wasn't right. "How did your pearl end up here?"

"Don't push it, Shizu-chan", Izaya's serious face reverted to his usual mischievous one.

I sighed, flopping against the stone behind me. I wanted to know more but I knew I had gotten my fill of information for the day. Whatever reason Izaya had to avoid my questions, it had something to do with his life before coming to Sagena. Whenever I inquired about his life then, he would close up like this, _but maybe one day…_

"Maybe one day…", I mumbled my thoughts without noticing.

The mischievous smile he was giving me faltered a bit at that and he quickly turned to look at the sea in front of us, pulling his legs to his chest before speaking again.

"Shizu-chan, why are you so interested in me?", he asked. "What am I to you?"

The question took me completely unguarded. I tensed when my mind deciphered it's meaning and turned to look at Izaya at the same time as he turned to look at me, eyes looking directly at mine. I gulped, unconsciously noticing a certain longing for the missing red glow of his eyes.

"I-You…", I closed my eyes and exhaled to calm myself, only opening my eyes again until I knew I was able to utter the correct answer. "You're… important to me", there was no point in denying it. Doing so has done nothing for my mental health all this time so I might as well just face these feelings head on.

Izaya's eyes scanned me intently, but this time, despite knowing that there was not a single ounce of doubt to be found in my eyes, his expression started to turn uncertain with each passing second. He finally turned away, as if unable to endure my stare anymore.

"If that's true, then trust me. You don't need to know everything about me", he mumbled.

I looked at him from the side for a minute, trying to come up with a way to make Izaya trust me with his past, but quickly gave up on that idea. Everybody has secrets that don't want to make public and even if I wanted to know everything about him, I had to give him his space for now. I stood up and dusted myself off, turning to face Izaya. He raised his head to see me, and I extended a hand so he could stand up.

"It's okay, you don't have to tell me now", I told him when he took my hand, pulling him up. "We have time"

His eyes widened a bit at my words, before he smiled and stood on his toes to steal a peck from my lips.

"Shizu-chan is more understanding than I thought", he praised in a much more relaxed tone. "I like that"

oOoOoOoOoOo

I returned to my room at the base in a good mood. After leaving Izaya safely inside of the cave I had returned to keep an eye on Vorona's behavior and was gladly met with her normal everyday routine. If things kept like this, we will be able to discard Vorona as a possible threat soon enough.

Things seemed to be going fine again.

_Knock, knock._

I turned to look at the door of my room._ Tom?_, I wondered at first, but discarded the possibility since he had his own key. _Then who?_

"Shizuo, it's us", the voice from a certain doctor answered my question. "Can we come in?"

I went to the door and let them in quickly. Of course, Celty was there with Shinra. Both entered in silence and then put their eyes on me, making me blink at their behavior. Shinra looked somewhat apologetic whilst Celty stare was definitely severe and a little worried.

"Is there… something wrong?", I carefully asked.

"Oh, it really depends on what you consider wrong, actually", Shinra commented in his usual chirpy tone, but that didn't dissipate the tension in the air.

"**Shizuo, we need to talk to you about the person you were with today**", Celty decided to clarify, knowing that his lover liked to beat around the bush a little too much.

"Izaya? What's wrong with him?", I asked, the topic suddenly taking a turn I wasn't liking, not with the eyes Celty was giving me.

Both of them turned to look at each other for a brief moment before Celty turned to me again.

"**He's a siren**"

oOoOoOoOoOo

_OtPr: That's all for today folks! How did you like that twist at the end? Hehehe, things will get rowdy from here, but I hope I can keep counting with your mental patronage! And what did you thought of the kiss? Please, be sincere! I can take it! I want to improve my smutty writing (don't tell my beta xD) As always, please don't be afraid to send me your thoughts and ideas, I'll see the way to add them if they don't mess the plot, and it's always fun to read how you seem to guess somethings right xD Until next time~_


	9. Chapter 9

**Author´s note:** Hello everyone! I'm here to bring you the next chapter! I hope you didn't wait too long, but if you did... Let me give you some good reasons why the wait was worth it! First! I have updated the cover of the story with the fanart from one of my readers, Malice Hawk! We have a siren Izaya! (Kyaaa! I love it, I can't help it) Secondly, for those of you waiting for the drama to finally happen... Ufufufu, the wait is over! And thirdly! This chapter is the longest so far, and according to my beta, is the best as well xD Enjoy!

**Guest: **Thanks! I hope you enjoy the next chappy too!

**shufflepink: **Hehehe, what will Celty and Shinra say about Izaya? What will happen to their relationship now? x3 Everything will be revealed now!

**silvervaga**: Thank you! I loved the kiss scene too! Even though I felt it somewhat anticlimactic but oh well, I'm glad you enjoyed it. Let's find out what happens now with those two x3

BTW, I'll be answering reviews after posting the chapter, so in the remote case that you wrote me in the past chapter and you haven't received a response yet, please give me a few minutes!

Now, please go on!

**Chapter 9**

**Shizuo´s POV**

"**He's a siren**"

Everything stopped.

"What…?", I managed to articulate while the rest of my body froze.

They knew.

_How? What will they do now? Did they tell anyone else? Is Izaya safe?_ I could feel the blood draining from my head and my fingers turning cold. _What should I do now?_

"Shizuo", Shinra's voice snapped me back.

I focused my eyes on them once more, their expressions still the same worried ones.

"**Did you know?**", Celty asked, her eyes boring into mine, pleading.

I opened my mouth, but nothing came out, the words just seemed stuck in my throat. _What can I tell them? _

"**Shizuo, please be sincere. Are you aware of what you're doing?**", she continued.

I had to force myself to answer something, I had to know what they knew and _how_.

"How… did you know?", I mumbled, finally finding my voice.

Celty's face faltered at the question.

"Well, that is not important now", Shinra interfered at that moment. "What really matters right now is that we came to warn you", the words entered my brain, but my mind only registered the possible threat in them.

"Warn me?", my body suddenly remembered how to work again, the blood starting to boil. "What about?", I tried to contain the growl behind the words.

"Shizuo, please calm down", Shinra said, raising both hands in surrender. "It is not what you think"

"You better start making sense now Shinra, if you don't want this door between your ribs", the one hand that I had still in the knob of the door tensed, molding the handle into the form of my palm.

"**Now, now; let's calm down**", Celty put herself in front of her lover and shaking her hands slightly since she wasn't one for violent confrontations.

I watched her for a few seconds before huffing and looking the other way, I had to calm down if I was getting anything out of them. I released the mangled door knob before turning to them again.

"So, what do you mean?", my voice gave away that I was still pissed, so they should get to the point _quick_.

"**First, please tell us if you already knew about him being a siren**", Celty insisted.

I took a deep breath before responding.

"So, what of it?", I mumbled, relaxing my shoulders but keeping my eyes on them.

Shinra sent me a small smile while Celty's face turned complicated. She looked relieved and saddened at the same time.

"See, I told you he was not being controlled", Shinra whispered to Celty in a very low and reassuring tone, but I was still able to catch them. Animal senses, Izaya would call them.

She smiled to him before returning to our conversation.

"**Shizuo, I know this may be hard…**", _Oh, I'm not going to like this_. "**But you need to stop meeting him**", Celty concluded with a severe gaze.

Her words ticked me off, but more than anything, I felt betrayed. Didn't I share with her enough for her to realize that I couldn't just _stop _meeting Izaya? How could she ask that of me?

"Why…?", I asked in a dangerously low tone.

"**Please, believe me. You have to cut off your relationship with him**"

"Why?!", I buffed, my sight going slightly red. " Just because he's a-!?"

"Ah, ah, ah, Shizuo. Are you sure you want to scream that? Here?" Shinra interjected, effectively shutting me up.

I immediately closed my mouth, biting my tongue in the process. I sure as hell didn't want more people finding out about Izaya, and that seemed to be Shinra and Celty's intention as well.

_Wait a second…_

"You haven't told anyone?", I asked in an incredulous whisper.

"Nope, and that is not our intention either", Shinra said in his usual tone, Celty shaking her head to confirm it. "We're merely here to persuade you"

"To not meet him again? Why?"

"**He's dangerous**", Celty took the word again. "**Shizuo, you need to stop meeting him. You may end up hurt or worse**"

"Celty…", I rolled my eyes at that. _Again with the superstitions?_. "I know what everybody thinks about… _people _like him", I carefully chose my words this time. " But trust me, he's not dangerous"

"**You don't know that**", she insisted, her eyes shining urgently. "**He's very sketchy and rejoices in making others suffer, you will end up tangled in his games without even noticing**"

"Wha-How do you know that?", the way she made it sound was so… personal.

"**Shizuo… You have to believe me, he's not as innocent as he may make out himself to be**", she kept evading the question.

"What do you know to be able to say that?", there was something in all this that was rubbing me the wrong way.

She took a step forward, but Shinra put a hand on her shoulder to stop her march. She turned and he gave her one of his rare worried expressions, the one that he only showed whenever Celty was concerned. She raised a hand to his and nodded slowly.

Shinra watched her for a while and smiled weakly before letting her go.

When she was right in front of me, she turned her face a little and removed the bangs that fell from her temple. The gesture confused me, since I was expecting her to keep on with the previous conversation, but that's when I saw them.

Dark long lines that surrounded the edge of her eye like _ugly tattoos._

I stared at the marks for far longer than needed, not sure about what kind of expression I was making, and not really caring either. After a minute I raised a curious hand and cautiously touched them. The skin beneath my fingers was slippery and twitched slightly. I removed my hand as if it had burnt me.

"Celty… you…", my mouth was dry, so my voice barely made it through.

She let her hair fall down again, effectively covering the telltale marks. Celty looked directly into my eyes before nodding.

She was a siren too.

oOoOoOoOoOo

After Celty's revelation I was more than willing to listen to whatever she had to say, so we locked the door and sit down so I could hear her reasons.

But I wasn't ready for what she had to tell me.

Celty started off with her life back at the sea and her story slowly made me aware that whatever notion I used to have about Izaya having somewhere to return to was a complete delusion.

The reality is that sirens live long, lonely lives since a very young age. The siren population is very scarce and the sea is just too vast. This means that even if a siren is born from two parents, once it is old enough to fend for itself, they will be abandoned and is more than likely that it will never see it's family again.

IF they're lucky enough to meet their parents, that is. And that is not the case most of the time.

With no family and obviously no underwater house to call home, a siren must live in constant movement, chasing food or being chased by bigger predators. There are a few lucky ones that get to meet other sirens along their travels and establish camaraderies, but big groups of sirens attract the attention of another terrible predator.

Humans.

We hunt them down, either to make prizes out of them or with even darker purposes. I didn't delve into this topic much, already aware of the type of atrocities our kind is capable of. And sure, their voice help them get out of the more dangerous situations, but they face a far stronger enemy.

What did it matter to survive, if you were condemned to a life of solitude?

Sirens, though human looking, are not familiar with the sense of love and loyalty that binds people together into societies and families. If a siren is deemed an unnecessary burden, it will be left behind, no looking back nor second thoughts about it...

After this part we remained in silence for a while. This conversation was turning heavier by the second, and I wasn't sure if I would end up liking what she would reveal to me about Izaya. But I had a hunch that I wouldn't.

"And… how did you meet him?", I asked quietly.

"**... I was alone for a very long time**", she started after a short while. "**When I met him, I was willing to do anything to not be alone anymore**"

I gulped at the despair that surfaced on her eyes for an instant.

"**He told me about an old legend of sirens and humans finding love together, and taught me the spell to change one's tail for legs**", she looked at her legs for a second.

"So you can never get back your tail?", I was curious about that, since I've only ever seen Izaya's spell.

Celty just smiled sadly, I decided that it would be better to leave that topic out.

"**He took advantage of my weaknesses to make me get near the humans, filling my head with marvelous ideas that he had no way of knowing himself, but I still did as he told me…**"

Shinra's hands had moved to her shoulders at some point during the story.

"**I…**", she stopped there, by this time she had such a forlorn expression that I couldn't bring myself to ask her to continue.

"She was captured by a group of bounty hunters", Shinra whispered, continuing for her, bracing her from behind tightly. Celty hugged his arms and took a deep breath to calm herself. "She was then sold at the black market"

I felt a sudden pang of guilt at this, for some reason feeling responsible for Izaya's actions.

"Luckily, my father was the one who found her", Shinra said with a smile, but I could see Celty's face turning a few shades paler at the mention of Shinra's father. _Better not to ask about it…_

We waited for Celty to calm down, so she could continue her tale.

"**Later on, I discovered that I was not the first one to fall for his stories, and not the last either**", she stopped for a second. "**But I certainly was the luckiest**", Celty was looking directly into my eyes. "**He's must be planning something, Shizuo**", she was practically begging me to believe in her.

And the worst part was that I did. I trusted Celty enough to know that she had no reason to lie about something like this, and I knew Izaya well enough to not put something like that past him.

That didn't make me feel any better about it, though.

"**Please promise me that you will cut off these meetings**", she got closer to me, emphasizing her concern.

I gulped. In my mind, her suggestion made perfect sense and the fact that Izaya had refused to relay any kind of information about his past to me only supported Celty's idea._ But still…_

"Celty, I… Thanks, but I'm sorry", I didn't know what else to tell her at that moment other than thanking her for her concern, but I couldn't just cut off Izaya like that. Not without hearing him out first.

We stared at each other, battling our wills with our eyes.

"**Are you… in love with him**?"

The bluntness of the question took me off guard. It was easy facing those feelings by myself, and even with Izaya himself, but admitting such a thing in front of others, that was a completely different story.

I couldn't stand the seriousness in her eyes any longer, so I removed my gaze first, my face getting too hot for comfort.

"Well, as you can see. My dearest here doesn't have the best opinion about this Izaya guy", Shinra said, looking at me with a condescending smile. "However, I don't think you should just stop meeting him"

Celty and I quickly turned to look at Shinra. Celty's eyes were open with disbelief at his words.

"What?", I asked, confused.

"I'm on the side that is not completely against your relationship with him", he added, his smile getting bigger. "I know what it feels like to fall in love with one of them, so you could say I'm rooting for you"

My jaw went slack at the comment.

"What do you…?"

"I mean, sure. He sounds like a total bastard and one day I will make him pay for what she did to my Celty, but I don't think you should give up on him just because of that. Maybe he has changed or there was a reason for what he did-"

Shinra was interrupted at that moment by Celty, who had finally snapped out of her awe and was shaking him by the shoulders, as if trying to smack some sense in him.

"Ah, ah, ah, my sweetest Celty! This kind of tough love is so invigorating!", she quickly released him after those words, realizing that he was enjoying the punishment instead.

Somehow, the whole scene had dissipated the previous tension in the room. I found myself watching amusedly as the pair in front of me had one of their usual disputes, those that ended when Shinra reminded Celty of how much he loved her. When they reached the evident conclusion, I got up from where I was.

"Heh, thank you guys", I said, relaxing a smile at them.

Both turned to look at me, stopping whatever it was that they were doing.

"**So you will…?**", Celty started, but I shook my head before she could continue.

"Celty, I'm really thankful for your concern", I put a hand on her hair, shuffling it a little and exposing the marks for a brief moment. "But I really can't leave the flea just like that, sorry", she seemed disappointed about my decision. "But, I can promise you that I will be careful, alright?"

She looked as if she wanted to keep discussing the issue and try to convince me once more, but Shinra, that had her hand trapped in one of his, squeezed it and stopped her. She turned to look at him and sighed, finally letting it go.

"**Okay…**", she turned to me again. "**Just be careful**"

I nodded reassuringly.

_Now, the only question is how should I tell Izaya about this…_

oOoOoOoOoOo

I had a hard time sleeping after what Celty told me, and when I was finally able to get some decent rest, my dreams were plagued with siren screams and haunting images of a pair of glowing red eyes that shined with a malicious glint.

I didn't want to believe that Celty's story had affected me so much, but it was clear that I hadn't been unscathed by it.

When I finally left for my round, the image from my dreams was still overlapping with my mental image of an innocently amused Izaya watching how cotton candy was made.

oOoOoOoOoOo

The day was passing by too fast for my liking. For the first time I was dreading my meeting with Izaya. Is not like I didn't want to see him, I just wasn't sure how I should ask him about his past and the reason why he did those things, or if I should just pretend that nothing happened and wait for him to tell me on his own.

_I mean, he is planning to do that eventually, right?_

I shook my head, trying to get my thoughts off the flea for a minute and do some decent surveilling instead.

"Superior", a voice called me from behind.

I quickly turned around, not really expecting to see anybody there since I didn't even notice when they approached me. I was slightly surprised to see Vorona behind me, clad in her lightweight armor except for the helmet.

"Vorona, I didn't see you there", I said, lifting a hand to my hair, wondering if I was really that distracted today to not notice her.

"Superior, I have been calling you for a while", she elaborated, her eyes scanning my face for some reason. "Pardon me, but you do not seem to be paying attention to your surroundings today", as usual, she was quite perceptive.

I smiled at the accuracy of her words.

"Nothing escapes you, does it?", I asked, walking over to the next part of my round. She followed close behind, waiting for me to continue. "Don't worry, it's nothing serious. I should be fine again after a smoke", _Or some explanation from Izaya._

"Is there something bothering you?", she insisted.

"I just had a rough night, you could say", I mumbled, trying not to delve into details.

I had decided that a cigarette wasn't such a bad idea, so I pulled one from my inside pocket and lighted it. The familiar smell filling my lungs helped me regain some clarity. Vorona was watching me intently the whole time.

"Was there anything you needed?", I asked her when I was done with half of my cigar.

She shook her head, but remained walking beside me. I didn't pay her any mind, my head still busy with other things. I knew that our routes will be separating soon enough when we reach the commercial district, so I didn't try to engage in any further conversation.

When we reached the fork on the road I simply bowed my head a little to bid her goodbye, turning to the road that led to the port and the last part of my round.

"Superior Shizuo", she called again, making me turn.

"Hm?", I took the last drag from my cigarette.

"Do not worry, everything will be solved soon", she said, giving me one of her rare small smiles.

I stared wide eyed at her statement before smiling on my own and throwing the cigar butt on the streets.

"I hope that you are right."

oOoOoOoOoOo

I purposefully prolonged my round at the sea market. My mind was still too biased by Celty's words and I didn't trust myself to act normally in front of Izaya when I finally met him again.

I wandered a bit off course and found myself staring at the gray cloudy sky from a corner of one of the big stores.

_It may rain soon…_

I was trying to think about trivial things when my thoughts were suddenly interrupted by a tap on my shoulder.

My breath got caught on my throat and I quickly turned around, only to be faced by Shinra and Celty. I breathed a sigh of relief. I most certainly didn't want to see those two right now, but anybody else was better than Izaya. At least until I was ready.

Celty waved her hand in a friendly manner, and for a moment it was like yesterday's conversation never happened.

"Hey, what are you guys doing here?", I asked, trying to sound normal.

"Checking on you actually", Shinra answered, no runaround this time.

"Huh?", I propped a brow at that, sincerely confused.

"**About yesterday…**", Celty hinted, her previous friendly smile taking on a sympathetic shine.

I sighed.

"I'm fine, you don't have to worry about me", I mumbled, not really in the mood to deal with them any longer.

"You don't look okay", he pointed.

"Alright, maybe I'm not _perfectly _fine", I conceded in an irritated tone. _What's up with people pointing that out today?_ "But I don't need you worrying over me, okay?", my hand unconsciously had already fished another cigarette from my pocket.

"**Shizuo… We didn't mean to upset you**", Celty continued despite the obvious threat in my voice. "**But you have to understand that-**"

"Yeah, yeah. I get it. You did it for my sake", I interrupted her. I knew I was being unfair, but I couldn't help my mood when it came to things I didn't know how to handle.

After that small outburst we remained in silence for a few seconds. I used that time to light my cigarette, taking a long drag that consumed half of it almost immediately.

"So… What will you do now?", Shinra asked.

I exhaled the smoke, watching it flow towards the clouds and disappear.

"I don't know", the words flew from my mouth as easily as the smoke. "To be sincere, I don't even know if I want to see him right now."

After a few seconds I heard a noise coming from the alley right beside us, like some cans were kicked or something. I took a few steps to check what could have caused it, scanning through it uninterestedly. There were some empty paint cans rolling on the floor and the person who must have knocked them was running away at full speed.

My eyes refocused when I recognized the black coat getting farther down the alley.

_Fuck!_

I had no time to explain what happened to Shinra and Celty, my body starting to run after him the moment I connected the events in my head and reached the only possible conclusion.

That coat was _Izaya's_.

That person _was _Izaya.

_Izaya heard us. _

oOoOoOoOoOo

"Oi! Wait!", I screamed after him when I thought I was finally within earshot, but Izaya didn't slow down in the slightest. If anything, he sped up even more.

_Tch! Damned flea, he's fast!, _I slightly regretted teaching him how to use his legs at all.

To top it all, the rain that had threatened to fall before was pouring down now, making everything even more chaotic than normal. Several street vendors were packing away their wares and trying to get away from the merciless nature while another handful of people were just running around, trying to find some shelter until the rain subsided, so I was having a hard time chasing after Izaya and evading the pedestrians on the way.

Izaya seemed unfazed by this, though, gracefully sidestepping any obstacle and jumping over the ones he couldn't avoid. Watching his back getting farther and farther away was starting to frustrate me. I needed to speak with him and clarify everything.

The rain was getting worse and I was barely able to see when Izaya made a sudden turn and entered one of the alleyways, but I smirked when I recognized it.

_Gotcha_.

I entered the alley, just in time to see how Izaya was still looking around, trying to find another exit to this dead end. He turned around to look at me, and I wasn't sure if my sight was deceiving me, but for a second he looked _hurt_.

"Izaya! Stop running already!", I roared, trying to calm him down, but my voice was more commanding than I intended.

He took a step back defensively , one of his hands darting to his coat pocket for some reason.

"Why should I?", he said with his usual shit-eating grin, his tone mocking, but I knew him well enough to know that he was just trying to distract me. "Was it not you the one who said that you didn't want to see me?", his voice betrayed him there, and I could clearly hear the bitterness in it.

The anger that had started to build in me completely disappeared after his words. I could feel my stare growing soft with guilt, but Izaya's own eyes just seemed to harden. I took a small step in his direction, but he took three steps back at my approach.

"Izaya…", I called him softly.

His eyes wavered for a second before he could put up his mask again, he took out his knife from his pocket and pointed it at me with a cold glare.

"What's with that stupid tone?", he spat, his voice was also void of emotion. "Are you going to deny what you said?"

My eyes widened at the attitude that Izaya had taken but I tried to keep my cool. I needed to calm him down.

"What you heard… It's not like that", I was fumbling to find the correct words. "I'm just-. I was just-"

"You can say it! You were just _afraid"_, he interrupted me, stressing on the last word. "Of course you would be. Who wouldn't? Knowing the true nature of someone you thought you _knew_", he smiled mockingly, but the same emotion didn't reach his eyes.

His eyes, despite the rain, looked sad, betrayed. Abandoned.

"I…", there were so many things I wanted to say to him right now, but the words just wouldn't come. "I'm pretty sure you must have had your reasons to-", I was interrupted by a dry laugh this time.

"Haha! So in the end, you're really just stupid, huh?", I had to admit that those words stung. "What if I told you that there was no reason? That I did everything out of boredom? What then?", he had a cold smile on his face right now.

Being told such things by Izaya himself threw me off, and whatever I was feeling at that moment must have shown on my face, because his smile fell off, leaving only a cold look.

"Heh, that's what I thought", he mumbled, putting away the hand with the knife. "Let's just stop this stupid pretend game, Shizuo", I internally cringed at my own name, not having heard it from Izaya in a long time. "Stop pretending that we are _friends_. Stop pretending that we _enjoy _our conversations. Let's stop pretending that we _care _about each other, okay?", my eyes had unconsciously lowered to the ground.

_Pretending?_

Those words ignited something deep inside me.

When I felt Izaya trying to pass beside me to get out of the alley, I tackled him and pushed his back to the wall, grabbing him by his arms.

"Let go of me, brute!", he spat after getting over the suddenness of the attack, struggling to get free from my grip.

"Pretend…?", I mumbled, not really hearing what he was saying.

"Huh?"

I finally raised my eyes, looking directly into his, pissed as I've never been in front of him.

"DON'T YOU FUCKING DARE TELL ME NOW THAT ALL THAT WAS JUST A PRETEND GAME!", I could no longer hold back my anger.

Izaya's eyes widened, but just as quickly he slipped into a full glare.

"What else could it have been?"

"Don't you dare, you little shit. Don't give me that bullcrap. You know it's not true!", my ears were buzzing with the blood boiling in my head. I could no longer hear the rain, or the pedestrians in the main street. I could hear nothing but Izaya.

He grinned with false bravery. "Oh? Why are you so mad? Is it that frustrating to think that it was all a lie?"

I pushed him against the wall even further, my knuckles breaking a few bricks in the process.

"No", I answered firmly. "What pisses me off is the fact that I _know _that you're lying"

He snorted. "And what makes you think that?"

"Because I felt it too, and I know you enough to tell when you're just being a stubborn liar", my breaths had steadily gotten fiercer. I was mad as hell and there was no way I was letting Izaya get away with those words.

"Ha! Well, it really takes a liar to recognize another, huh?", he shoot in an accusing tone.

The accusation took me off guard. I released him.

"What do you mean?"

"Your protozoan brain seems to have already forgotten, huh?", he gave me a pitiful smile. "Let me kindly remind you who was the one who said that 'I didn't have to tell you everything now' and that 'we had time'? Rings any bells?"

I remembered saying something similar.

"I didn't ask them to tell me!", I quickly defended myself. "I didn't even knew they knew about you before yesterday", I glared at him again. "Those things I said, I completely meant them. I still do"

Izaya looked directly at my eyes, and for a moment it felt like he was scanning them as usual.

"Why couldn't you trust me? No matter what you say now, I know what the real you looks like"

"What do you know-?", I didn't let him finish.

"There is no way you could have faked those emotions", I looked him directly in the eye. "Those were _real_, Izaya. Stop lying to yourself"

"You know nothing about the real me! How can you tell?!", he barked back.

"What are you so afraid of?! Why do you insist in claiming that I don't know you?! If that is really true, then that is because you have been so damn earnest in not telling me shit about you, but not because I wouldn't have liked to!"

He lowered his gaze when I was done, his wet bangs falling over his eyes and preventing me from seeing his expression.

"...up…", he whispered.

"What?", I got closer, thinking that he had finally given up.

"Shut up... Shut up. Shut up!", he started repeating, each time gaining more volume. He finally raised his head and sent me a spiteful glare.

We remained in silence for a few seconds, Izaya was huffing while looking at me, but I had somehow completely calmed down.

"If you were a siren, would that have been a command just now?"

He lashed his knife across my left cheek and I closed my eyes, opening them a second later just in time to see Izaya getting out of the alley and running into the main street. I clicked my tongue before running after him.

When I got out to the street I was surprised to see it almost empty now that everybody had already taken shelter under some roof. In the distance I could hear the splashes of Izaya's shoes getting deeper into the city. I made complete use of my hearing sense to track him down, quickly catching up now that there were not as many obstacles as before.

"IZAAAYAAA!", I screamed his name, knowing full well that he could hear me this time.

He didn't even turn back, getting out to another main street and aiming for the next alley to get into. I jumped into the road after him, too focused on catching the flea to even notice the huge motorized car coming directly at me at full speed.

I heard a stirring noise before feeling the metal crash against my body. The next thing I noticed was the sky, a little clearer than before, flying past above me and the rain falling over my face.

I collided with my shoulder against the stones of the street, rolling a few times before stopping face down. I heard a woman scream close and I groaned. My whole body was numb and I was suffering a skull-splitting headache. I turned my head a little, but quickly decided to not do it again when the headache just escalated.

I slowly opened my eyes, but the world was all just a big blur. When the images finally remained still, I could see a few people already gathering around me. The last thing I remember was making eye contact with a pair of worried red eyes before everything swirled once more and turned black.

oOoOoOoOoOo

_OtPr: Well! How was it? Did you felt the feelings in this chapter? I sure hope you did! I've never poured so many raw feelings in my writing, so I hope you noticed them! As always, please let me know what you feel about this story. I love every tiny bity wittle review I get from you guys. We have almost reached the 100th review! As a special something for you my lovelies, if you are the 100th reviewer and send me an idea for a oneshot, I'll write it for you as a gift! The only restriction will be that it has to be a Shizaya, everything else is up to your imagination! Good luck and may the odds be ever in your favor!_


	10. Chapter 10

**Author´s note:** I'm so sorry everyone! I changed jobs just recently and as you may know if you read my previous notes, I used to write whole chapters while at work, and guess what? My new job does't have free internet! Boohoo, poor me. I know this is not a good enough excuse, but I still wanted to let you know. And thank you very much for all of your support! I love you all and I wish this chapter was good enough to make up for the long wait, but do not fear! The good part is coming right after this one and I have managed to find a way to write at work again! Yeeeey~ Ahem, well, let's head on to the anon section!

**UsUkShiZayaSinJa: **Thanks! I hope your finals went well! We'll get to know more about Izaya true intentions on the following chapters, so stay tuned!

**Guest 1 (By order of appearance): **Hehe, thanks sweetheart. Enjoy this one as well.

**Guest 2: **I'm sorry that there is no happy resolution in the near future, but please enjoy the drama :3

**Guest 3: **I'm glad! Stop by anytime!

**silvervaga**: Thank you for your super funny review! I'm so sorry I couldn't update sooner, but do not worry, the feels are coming alright!

**Hakumeyen:** Ahahaha... I'm sorry I couldn't update sooner. I'm a bad author-san A Forgive me?

**shufflepink**: A Izaya point of view of the story? That sounds interesting but I'm really bad at impersonating Izaya QwQ Still! Please enjoy the next chapter!

**gabby:** Will he ever find his pearl I wonder...? Hahaha, thankies for your review!

**Guest 4:** Sorry! Here is the next chappy!

**XxJoyluvxX:** I hope you really didn't check everyday! OnO! It would make me feel even worse! Enjoy the next chappy!

**Guest 5:** Thank you! I hope you didn't wait that long. Please enjoy the next chappy :3

For all my lovelies who reviewed with an account, I will be answering those shortly! Now, this way please~

**Chapter 10**

**Shizuo´s POV**

When I opened my eyes again, I was looking at a very familiar ceiling.

I blinked a few times, trying to remember what happened the day before and suddenly the images from today's chase came back to me: Izaya running away, managing to corner him and having a heated discussion, the slash of a flick blade and running after him again and then...

_Right. I got hit by a car..._

I sighed while dragging a hand over my face.

Looking around, I half-hoped to see a certain raven close by my bed, but there was no one else but me in my room.

What was I thinking yesterday, running after Izaya like that? Doing that just made me look like I was at fault. _I mean, sure, I did want to know about his past, but it wasn't like I directly asked them about it._

I sat up, glad to notice that I had no difficulty in doing so, and quickly made up my mind to go and look for Izaya. We needed to talk, for real this time.

But, right when I was ready to jump out of the bed, the door of the room flew open, letting a very angry nurse in.

Celty looked around the room before her eyes fell on me, freezing me in mid-step out of the bed. She looked downright pissed while she marched towards my bed. When she was right in front of me she pushed me down, not strongly enough to actually move me, but her cold stare was all it took to make me back down.

I have never seen Celty so pissed off before.

"Are you mad at me?", I dared to ask when she just turned around to take some pills from my bedside table.

She didn't look over or made any sign of having heard me.

"Celty…", I called her, trying to get a reaction out of the silent woman.

She abruptly turned back, her hands shaking and her face a furious shade of red.

"**You promised!**", her violent movements made me back down further into the bed. "**You promised you would be careful, and look at you!**", for some reason I could very well hear the anger of her voice in my head.

"Celty, calm down…", I tried again, but she refused to listen.

"**I told you he meant trouble and look at you now! You got hit by a motorized car!**", she was way too deep into her ramble to listen to me.

"That was not his fault…", I mumbled, looking the other way.

"**That's what he wants you to think! For all you know, he could have manipulated you into running into that car from the beginning!**"

"Celty", I called her in a more serious tone.

"**The worst thing is that I warned you just yesterday…**", her angry mask finally slipped off her face and worry replaced it.

I sighed at her expression. I knew she meant well, but she was overreacting.

"Celty, I know you don't trust Izaya. But trust _me_, okay?", I reasoned with her.

Her face didn't change much at my statement, but after awhile she took a long breath in, calming down a bit.

"Besides, this wasn't his fault, we were running and not looking at our surroundings. An accident was bound to happen."

_I'm actually glad it was me_, I kept that thought to myself.

I threw a sidelong glance to Celty, who had remained quiet for a while. She still looked upset, but mostly worried and concerned. I placed a hand over her tightly fisted one to reassure her.

"This is nothing for me. You know I'm tough", I smiled again.

Celty finally sighed, slumping her shoulders. She knew about the story behind my inhuman strength, so deep down she knew that an accident like this was nothing life-threatening to me.

"He's right, Celty", Shinra entered through the open door, looking through a few papers. He raised his eyes with his usual smile before closing the door behind him. "It never ceases to amaze me how resilient you actually are, Shizuo", he said in an overly excited tone. "No broken bones, no big bruises and no reason to ground you to your room either", that last part was slightly hinted towards Celty.

She huffed, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Thanks, Shinra", I quickly said, sliding off the bed and picking out some clean clothes, "By the way, did Izaya come by when I was out of it?", I asked, trying to sound nonchalant while I dressed behind a curtain.

"Nope, the only ones who came to visit were Tom and Vorona", he responded. "You were just dead cold for a few hours anyways", he added.

I cursed through my teeth. I hoped that Izaya had gotten back to the safety of the cave during those hours.

As soon as I was fully clothed again I rushed for the door, with Celty hot on my heels, surely trying to convince me to at least wait until tomorrow. I tried to ignore her the best I could and opened the door, almost colliding with the person that was already on the other side.

I glared at the sudden obstacle before noticing who it was.

"Heiwajima, I'm glad to see that you're already back on your feet", were the impassive words that greeted me, snapping me out of my sudden anger.

I stood straight, saluting the captain with my right hand. He made a dismissive gesture with his hands, telling me to relax again.

"Captain Shiki, what a surprise to have you here at our humble dorms", Shinra greeted him, giving him one of his characteristic polite smiles.

"One of my soldiers got hit by a car on the streets, shouldn't it be normal for me to check on them?", Shiki smoothly responded while entering the room with his second in command, the First Lieutenant Akabayashi, in tow.

Akabayashi was an imposing man that always had a smile on his face and a patch over his right eye. What laid beneath it was a mystery to us all.

"Well, of course not. But we're talking about Shizuo Heiwajima here, whose indestructibility is well known around these parts, are we not?", Shinra continued, completely unfazed by the two men.

Shiki let out a small sigh before answering.

"You got me there Doctor Kishitani, my visit may not be all out of concern", he conceded, turning to look at me with a serious expression.

_Me? _I internally cringed, the image of Izaya quickly returning to my mind. _Does he know?_

"Heiwajima", he called.

"Yes, sir?", I responded as calmly as I could muster.

"I have a mission for you".

oOoOoOoOoOo

I was alone in my room now, re-reading the damned assignation order in my hands for the umpteenth time. _This has to be a joke. _

I just couldn't freaking believe this! I was leaving for a frigging mission TOMORROW, at DAWN. And one that would last at least a week, at that.

When the captain gave me the assignation I immediately read the specifics and could only let a dry, unbelieving laugh escape my lips at the absurdity of it all. The man in front of me didn't find anything funny about it, though, if his unchanging expression was anything to go by.

I groaned, rubbing the bridge of my nose to calm down. I glanced around the room, checking the current state of chaos of the place.

_Guess I overdid it._

Still dazed by the sudden change in my immediate future, I couldn't even muster an answer for the captain when he left. Celty and Shinra stayed a little while longer before noticing that I was about to go on a destruction spree. They wisely decided to leave then, abandoning me to my anger and frustration.

The second I was finally left alone, I let out a strangled groan, letting my temper get the better of me. Throwing over the chairs, tables and basically anything I could get my hands on, the whole room had turned into a mess by the time Tom arrived back with the same assignation order in his hands.

Noticing my current bad mood, he deemed it wise not to ask about it, silently picking up clothes and furniture and setting up two bags for our mission. If I were in any other state of mind, I would have felt bad for leaving everything to Tom, but right now I could only stare at the stupid piece of paper and hope that it would just spontaneously combust in front of me.

_What were the odds? _

Not a single mission in the whole year I've been living in Sagena, and the one day I really need to be here and fix the things with Izaya, a week-long mission. I didn't know if I should laugh at my fate or curse it.

_Should I play sick and not go at all?_, my mind suggested.

I silently chuckled at the idea, knowing full well that it was impossible to avoid this mission after the captain himself handed me the assignation order. I had my hands tied.

"Hey", I suddenly heard a voice breaking the tense silence.

I lifted my eyes from the paper for the first time in what could have been ages to look at Tom. He was looking at me with a small condescending smile.

"I may not know exactly what happened to put you in this mood", he said, throwing a look around the room where some clothes were still scattered around. "But I think I know you enough to tell that you must be just overthinking things"

I opened my eyes in surprise at Tom's statement.

"I mean, you only ever get frustrated when you don't know what to do. But most of the times you just have to get up and do it, whatever you're doubting", he concluded, scratching the back of his head.

Tom's words made me realize that he was right. I could spend the rest of the night moping about my bad luck, or I could just suck it up and go talk to Izaya.

As if possessed, I immediately went to open the door, sending a grateful glance at Tom before crossing the doorway and running for the nearest exit to town as fast as my legs could carry me.

I swear I heard a long sigh coming from somewhere behind me.

oOoOoOoOoOo

I reached the entrance of the cave completely out of breath, but right before entering, my body froze. I was willing myself to take the first step into the dark creek, but my mind was having doubts about it. My brain had suddenly decided it convenient to remind me of the argument that I had with Izaya just earlier today and my iron-like resolve started to shatter.

_Will he even listen to me?,_ I wondered, not so sure anymore that this was a good idea. Was I ready to explain everything to him this time around? I already knew just how good I was at explaining myself where Izaya was concerned, and I wasn't even sure where to start the next time I faced him. Should I apologize for the misunderstanding or start right away with the truth of what actually happened?

_Does it even matter?, _a pissed off voice resounded within my head._ Just fucking go and make up with him!_

I took the first step into the creek, trying not to overthink it anymore.

oOoOoOoOoOo

I reached the pond sooner than I expected, but it could have been just my anxiousness taking its toll on me. I stood there, waiting, half hoping that Izaya made his appearance already and half dreading the moment he did.

When five minutes went by without any change in the surface of the water I knew that Izaya wasn't going to come out. I knew he was there, if the clothes sprawled around were anything to go by, but he was not going to face me, just like earlier.

I continued to stare at the water surface with my patience straining to impossible lengths, powerless and frustrated as I've never felt before. Once more I was reminded that if Izaya didn't want to do something, there was nothing that I could do to change that. I finally clicked my tongue, slightly feeling how my nails had buried onto my palms by the sheer strength I was using to fist them.

I looked at my hands and I sighed, relaxing my arms. There was no point in getting frustrated now, even though I really wanted to make up before leaving tomorrow.

"Flea, look", I started out, only receiving my echo as a response. "I'm not even sure if you can hear me like this…", I mentally slapped myself, this was not the time to get discouraged. "I really wanted to talk to you today, I wanted to explain you everything. But you just had to go and make your own assumptions…", a small snarl escaped my lips, but I had to remind myself to calm down. "I don't care about your past… No wait, it's not like that", I scratched my head. Trying to have a conversation when I was the only one doing the talking was not my forte. "What I'm trying to say is that it doesn't matter what you did before!", I shouted, as if by doing that the meaning will get across more easily.

I remained in silence after that, hoping against hope that Izaya would decide to come out now after my little speech, miraculously touched by my words. But the waters remained as impassive as ever, mocking my feeble attempt at fixing things.

"... I was assigned to a mission", I mumbled. "I will not be here for a week", I clenched my teeth, still mad about it. "I just wanted to let you know", I turned around to leave, not being able to handle the silence any longer.

I walked my way out, but right when I was about to step into the creek that would lead me outside, I stopped to look back one more time.

I didn't like leaving like this. I didn't like not being able to make amends with Izaya, but I wasn't being given any other choice.

"Be careful", I mumbled before getting out.

oOoOoOoOoOo

The next morning we left very early. The town where the mission was assigned was a little far away from Sagena and we had to mount a campament in the mountains during the first night. I had not slept well the night prior, and the following night was no different, with the constant thought that Izaya might ran into trouble while I was away. Or even worse, that Izaya decided to leave for the ocean while I was not there to stop him.

My mood was just worsening the farther we got from Sagena.

By the end of the second day of travel, we finally arrived to the town. It was a small and cozy place between the mountains, but because of that it seemed that some bandits had decided to place their headquarters nearby and were assaulting the people who traveled along these paths. The townspeople, tired of this abuse, had decided to reach out for help from the mainland. So basically, we just had to pin point these bandits' lair and kick them out of here.

It wasn't a particularly tough mission, so I wasn't really sure why I was specially requested to come here. I guess it was just a provisory measure to ensure that it will be successful one, but the only thought that was on my mind was to finish this quick and wrap everything up so I could return as soon as possible.

The night of our arrival, we gathered around a big bonfire to have our dinner. The townsfolk had welcomed us warmly with the little food they were able to muster up in such a short notice, and were now having dinner along with us. It was a very heartwarming situation, but I couldn't help to feel a hollow sensation inside.

I decided not to bum everybody else's dinner with my mood and went to sit on the farthest tree stump to the fire. I watched the night sky for a while, wondering what could Izaya be doing at the moment.

"Hey", I heard a friendly voice calling.

I dropped my gaze to catch the figure of Tom sitting on a stump near me with a bowl of his own.

"Yo", I lazily answered back, not exactly thrilled by the company, but not hating it either.

"What are you doing all the way here?", Tom casually asked me, giving me a sidelong glance. "Something on your mind?"

"I think is rather someone, actually", I boldly admitted, raising my gaze to the stars once more.

"I see... ", he answered. If he was surprised by my answer, it really didn't show.

We remained in silence for a while, listening to the sound of the fire crackling and the animated voices of the people surrounding it.

"That Izaya boy I assume?", Tom interrupted the silence not much after that.

I quickly incorporated myself to look at Tom properly. The shock must have shown on my face, since Tom chuckled at me when I looked at him.

"What? You can't possibly think that I wouldn't notice, right?", he retorted with a snicker. "You were the one who told me about it, remember?", I blinked, pretty sure I never told Tom about this, mostly because I had just figured out my own feelings not too long ago. "Anyways, I just had bit and pieces, but everything fell in place when I saw you during the festival".

I felt a slight warm sensation cover my cheeks before I decided to turn the other way, not being able to take Tom's cheshire grin anymore.

"Hahaha! You have nothing to feel embarrassed about!", Tom barked, smacking my back."I just knew it was him when I saw you looking so happy around him", the heat of my cheeks was rapidly expanding all the way to my ears. "He was quite cute, that Izaya", his tone was teasing, but I couldn't help the glare that escaped my eyes.

"Excuse me", a small voice interrupted us from behind.

We turned around to face whoever had called us. It was one of the ladies who were helping serve the dinner before. She had quite a petit complexion and was looking at us with an amused smile, as if we were just discussing something really interesting.

"I'm sorry for dropping in on your conversation all of a sudden, but I couldn't help myself", she excused herself, but she didn't look or sound very apologetic.

She was actually looking at me with curious eyes. She quickly took a seat right beside me on the same stump, her eyes never even turning to Tom. We stared at her with awkward expectation, trying to figure out what this girl wanted since she wasn't explaining herself.

"Did you just say 'Izaya'?", she cut the chase, her expression not even changing one bit.

My eyes widened at the mention of Izaya's name before I glared at her with distrust. _Who the hell is this girl?_

"Who-?', but before I could finish my question, the woman spoke again.

"Oh, where are my manners?", she said, smacking her head lightly. She then extended a hand towards me. "My name is Saki"

oOoOoOoOoOo

_OtPr: Well... How was it? Slow paced? I personally don't like this chapter very much. (I don't like low rhythm chapters, but my beta reminds me that they are necessary to build up the story). But I really hope it wasn't that disappointing either! Here is a new character! What will Saki add to the story, hmm~? You will find out soon enough! Now! Regarding the little contest from last chapter! Congratulations to_ Noah Earl Graves_ for being the 100th review! (Pops party poppers). And according to your request, I will be making a One Shot with Psyche, Delic, Tsugaru and Hibiya and our lovelies here, when this story is over! Regarding that, I have a very important announcement to do! This story is nearing it's end! TwT Finally, it was very hard to reach this point, but I completely owe this to you, my readers. Thank you for being there and I hope you will remain there for the rest of the path! See you next time!_


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